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Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning gestures during a press conference at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Beijing, Thursday, Oct 13, 2022. The Chinese government on Thursday accused Washington of “Cold War thinking” and appealed for efforts to repair strained relations after President Joe Biden released a national security strategy that calls for “out-competing China” and blocking its efforts to reshape global affairs.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning gestures during a press conference at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Beijing, Thursday, Oct 13, 2022. The Chinese government on Thursday accused Washington of “Cold War thinking” and appealed for efforts to repair strained relations after President Joe Biden released a national security strategy that calls for “out-competing China” and blocking its efforts to reshape global affairs.
BEIJING (AP) — The Chinese government on Thursday accused Washington of “Cold War thinking” and appealed for efforts to repair strained relations after President Joe Biden released a national security strategy that calls for “out-competing China” and blocking its efforts to reshape global affairs.
The foreign ministry also accused Washington of trade protectionism after Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said the United States would reinforce its global supply chains to guard against “geopolitical coercion” by China, Russia and other governments.
Biden’s document Wednesday accused China of trying to “erode U.S. alliances” and “create more permissive conditions for its own authoritarian model.” It called for “out-competing China” in political alliances and “global governance” as well as business, technology and military affairs.
U.S.-Chinese relations are at their lowest level in decades, strained by disputes over technology, security, Taiwan and human rights.
“Cold War thinking and zero-sum games, sensationalizing geopolitical conflicts and great power competition are unpopular and unconstructive,” said Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning. She called on Washington to “meet China halfway and promote China-U.S. relations back to a healthy and stable track.”
The White House document calls for the United States to “maintain a competitive edge” over China, which has antagonized Japan, India and other neighbors with an increasingly assertive foreign policy and growing military.
China’s multibillion-dollar Belt and Road Initiative to build ports, railways and other infrastructure across Asia and Africa has fed concern in Washington, Moscow and other capitals that Beijing is trying to build its strategic influence and undermine theirs.
China, with the second-largest global economy and military, is the “only competitor with both the intent to reshape the international order and, increasingly, the economic, diplomatic, military and technological power to do it,” the document says.
Mao, speaking at a regular news briefing, said China was a “defender of the world order” and rejected “sensationalizing geopolitical conflicts and great power competition.”
Mao criticized the “weaponization of economic and trade issues” after Yellen said Wednesday the United States was trying to reduce reliance on China and other Asian suppliers of semiconductors, electric vehicle batteries, solar panels and other technology.
President Xi Jinping’s government is spending heavily to reduce its need for U.S. and other Western technology by developing its own creators of processor chips, artificial intelligence, aerospace and other know-how. Beijing is pressing Chinese companies to reduce reliance on global supply chains by using domestic vendors whenever possible, even if that increases costs.
“We know the cost of Russia’s weaponization of trade as a tool of geopolitical coercion, and we must mitigate similar vulnerabilities to countries like China,” Yellen said in Washington.
The United States should “abandon unilateralism and protectionism,” Mao said, and work with “the international community to maintain the security and smooth flow of the industrial and supply chain.”
Copyright 2022 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
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The European Union’s executive arm is proposing legislation to force manufacturers to ensure that devices connected to the internet meet cybersecurity standards. The aim is to make the 27-nation bloc less vulnerable to attacks. The EU says a ransomware attack takes place every 11 seconds. The global annual cost of cybercrime was estimated at 5.5 trillion euros in 2021. According to the European Commission, an increase of cyberattacks was witnessed during the coronavirus crisis. Russia’s war in Ukraine has also raised concerns that European energy infrastructure could be targeted amid a global energy crunch.
The ride-hailing service Uber says all its services are operational following what security professionals are calling a major data breach. It says there is no evidence the hacker got access to sensitive user data. But the breach, apparently by a lone hacker, put the spotlight on an increasingly effective and polished break-in routine: The hacker appears to have gained access by tricking an Uber employee into surrendering their credentials. Screenshots the hacker shared with security researchers indicate they obtained full access to the cloud-based systems where Uber stores sensitive customer and financial data. It is not known how much data the hacker took.
Facebook parent Meta has unveiled a high-end virtual reality headset with the hope people will soon be using it to work in the virtual reality of the still-elusive place called the metaverse. The $1,500 Meta Quest Pro headset sports high-resolution sensors that let people see mixed virtual and regular old reality in full color, as well as eye tracking and so-called “natural facial expressions” that mimic the wearer’s facial movements so their avatars appear natural when interacting in VR. The question now is, will people buy it?
The Michigan Economic Development Corporation has approved $400 million in incentives for two electric vehicle battery factories. The plants will cost an estimated $4 billion and bring 4,500 jobs to the state. Now lawmakers must approve the incentives that would come from a fund Michigan created to help land major business expansions. Energy-storage company Our Next Energy plans its $1.6 billion factory in a township outside Detroit. The Chinese manufacturer Gotion plans a $2.4 billion plant in Big Rapids in northern Michigan. President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act requires batteries to be made in the USA for electric vehicles to qualify for a federal tax credit of up to $7,500.
China’s internet censors have moved quickly to scrub social media posts after reports that banners criticizing the Communist leadership were hung from a busy intersection in Beijing. Images on Twitter, which is blocked in China, showed smoke spiraling up from a fire on an elevated roadway and banners calling for an end to the hard-line “zero-COVID” policy and the overthrow of President Xi Jinping. The Associated Press could not verify the authenticity of the images, but the road was scarred in the area where the fire would have been. Political protest is rare in China, and police are on high alert this week in the run-up to a major Communist Party congress that opens Sunday.
It’s becoming clearer that New York City’s recovery from the pandemic will be drawn out and that some aspects of the city’s economic ecosystem could be changed for good. More workers returned to their offices as the summer ended. But those limited numbers mean continued hardship for New Yorkers whose jobs are built around the commuting class. Remote work has brought an upswing in jobs and liveliness to some neighborhoods in the outer boroughs. But that hasn’t made up for what’s been lost. The city’s unemployment rate was over 6% in August. That’s significantly higher than the national rate of under 4%.
Electric truck and SUV maker Rivian Automotive says it is recalling almost all the vehicles it has delivered to customers in order to tighten a loose fastener that could potentially affect drivers’ ability to steer. The company founded in 2009 said Friday it is recalling about 13,000 vehicles because a fastener connecting the vehicles’ front upper-control arm and steering knuckle may not be torqued enough. It said there have been seven reports potentially related to the issue, but no injuries have been reported. The company based in Irvine, California, said the fix would only take a few minutes, and it expects to be able to repair them all in about 30 days, with customer collaboration.
A former manager for a Silicon Valley security business that worked with Facebook has testified at a sheriff’s civil corruption trial that he and the company’s CEO agreed to provide political donations in exchange for concealed-weapons permits. The Mercury News reported that Martin Nielsen testified publicly for the first time Monday and detailed how he was tasked with finding a way to get their high-level security agents concealed-carry permits after a 2018 shooting at the YouTube campus. Santa Clara County Sheriff Laurie Smith has not been directly implicated in the two criminal indictments that ensnared her undersheriff and a captain. Her term ends in January. But if the jury finds just one count to be true, she would be removed from office early.
India’s government says it has rescued about 130 Indian workers from Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos after they were lured by agents for fake job opportunities in the information technology sector in Thailand. A spokesperson for the External Affairs Ministry says some fraudulent IT companies appear to be engaged in digital scamming and forged cryptocurrencies, and that the Indian workers were held captive and forced to commit cyber fraud. He says the companies appear to be operating through agents in Dubai, Bangkok and some Indian cities and are recruiting Indian workers through social media advertisements for fake highly lucrative jobs in Thailand.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning gestures during a press conference at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Beijing, Thursday, Oct 13, 2022. The Chinese government on Thursday accused Washington of “Cold War thinking” and appealed for efforts to repair strained relations after President Joe Biden released a national security strategy that calls for “out-competing China” and blocking its efforts to reshape global affairs.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning gestures during a press conference at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Beijing, Thursday, Oct 13, 2022. The Chinese government on Thursday accused Washington of “Cold War thinking” and appealed for efforts to repair strained relations after President Joe Biden released a national security strategy that calls for “out-competing China” and blocking its efforts to reshape global affairs.
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