• China property collapse remains growth drag, spur for exports
• Property prices must fall 40% more, one analyst says
• Xi redirects capital to strategic manufacturing from property

Archived

The one-time billionaire who came to personify the boom and bust of China's property market was sentenced to life in prison last week by a Chinese court.

But the collapse of the sector, entering its sixth year, ​remains a drag on the world's second-biggest economy, a pain point for millions of households and a force for export-reliant growth and trade friction for ‌China. ...

Analysts say there is no clear end in sight.

Many angry homeowners and creditors — in comments that went initially uncensored on Chinese social media — asked why Hui Ka Yan, once Asia's richest person and the founder of China Evergrande, was not given the death penalty after being convicted of crimes ranging from misuse of funds to bribery.

Six years after China's financial regulators cracked down on the heavily leveraged property sector, the pain continues.

Millions of partially built properties sit derelict across China, a recovery in new-home prices in the biggest cities, like Beijing and Shanghai, has stalled, land sales continue to plunge and declines are accelerating in property sales and construction.

In smaller, inland cities, second-hand home prices are down almost a quarter from 2020 levels, a brake on consumption.

...

The more than doubling of China's trade surplus since 2019 has escalated trade tensions with the EU and the US and driven concerns about a "China Shock 2.0" as exports displace local industries for trading partners, including in the Global South.

...

"The problem is systemic, and there's not much you can do about it," said Sam Radwan, chief executive of Chicago-based real estate consultancy Enhance International.

"You have more homes than households — second homes were used as an investment by over a third of the population."

Evergrande defaulted in 2021 and began liquidation in 2024. Competitor Country Garden defaulted in 2023 and has not made any land purchases since then, while China Vanke is seeking to extend some bond repayments and has replaced most of its top management with executives from state-owned enterprises.

President Xi Jinping has sought to redirect bank credit and state support from real estate to strategic tech industries, like robotics and semiconductors. But those emerging sectors remain too small to offset the drag from a continued housing slump, analysts say.

"Growth and the benefits of growth are much more narrowly distributed throughout the economy," said Max Zenglein, senior economist at the Conference Board Asia. "That's a key reason why consumption isn't picking up."

...

Radwan estimates it will take 18 months to clear home inventory. Home prices must drop a further 40 per cent from 2025 levels to reach an equilibrium, he says, a process that could take another decade.

"Chinese citizens are very smart people," Radwan said. "They know well enough that they're nowhere near the bottom but they can't see the bottom."

...

"The pain is unbearable," said Jason Wang, a 38-year-old homeowner. The value of his home in the province of Shandong, one of the areas hardest hit by the housing crisis, has sunk 25 per cent since he bought it in 2019, he said.

"When people can barely feed themselves, who can afford to buy a house?"

...

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/58092995

Archived

Held in a Hong Kong prison without trial for the past five years, Chow Hang-tung has had few ways to communicate with the outside world. So when her partner, the Chinese dissident Ye Du, proposed to her by writing a letter, she was forced to respond in kind. “We really need to speed up the process of ending this dictatorship, otherwise when will we ever see each other again?” she wrote.

In 2021, Chow was charged with “inciting subversion” under a Beijing-imposed national security law, which also makes the promotion of Hong Kong’s secession from China a crime. On 21st August this year, she was convicted. She now faces up to ten years in prison.

[...]

Chow’s verdict comes amid an accelerating crackdown in Hong Kong, as authorities recently expanded the reach of the national security law, giving the region’s chief executive expanded powers to reclassify any criminal case as a matter of national security. While most of the democracy movement within Hong Kong has been dismantled or driven underground, Chow has remained a rare voice of open defiance.

When she was a child, her mother would take her to vigils in Hong Kong’s Victoria Park marking the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. Later in life, organising this annual vigil would land her and two fellow activists in detention.

[...]

In 2007, Chow received a postgraduate scholarship to study geophysics at Cambridge university, specialising in seismology. When an earthquake hit the Chinese region of Sichuan in 2008, she was frustrated by what she saw as the government’s role in worsening the impact of the natural disaster. It was then that Chow turned her attention to human rights, retraining and qualifying as a barrister in the mid-2010s.

Back in Hong Kong, she advocated for labourers in mainland China and built connections with Chinese dissidents.

[...]

She was sometimes criticised by fellow activists in the Hong Kong democracy movement for focusing on the rights of mainland dissidents over issues closer to home. But according to her friend, the activist Patrick Poon, Chow was “prophetic” in seeing how the experience of dissidents in China foreshadowed what was to happen in Hong Kong. While many of the movement’s leaders had fled abroad, he says Chow was determined to remain inside the region.

“What she saw and heard in mainland China made her realise more deeply that whether a society has freedom, rule of law and civil rights is not an abstract political concept, but directly affects the lives of every ordinary person,” her fiancé Ye Du tells me. He is barred from leaving China and has been placed under strict surveillance. The couple have not been able to communicate with each other since February last year.

One early morning in June 2021, police smashed down the door to her barrister’s chambers and arrested Chow. Despite the significant constraints of her detention, including limited access to legal resources, she chose to represent herself in court, sometimes using court submissions to turn the table on the legal system itself.

[...]

Chow, 41, sees few reasons to feel optimistic about the future of Hong Kong right now, she refuses to give up hope.

“No one can predict the future, but we should not lose our confidence in the people, who are where hope lies”, she says. “We should not underestimate the people’s resilience.”

[...]

Archived

[...]

Under China’s “AI Plus” initiative and its five-year plan through 2030, the government is pushing to infuse AI across many industries.

[...]

“What is specific to China is that the government is really into diffusing AI across the economy, so AI may get into different domains more quickly comparing to other countries,” said Zilan Qian, a research associate at Oxford China Policy Lab.

China’s economic growth has already been slowing. Consumer spending has lagged partly due to people becoming reluctant to spend because they’re worried about losing their jobs. It’s added to problems stemming from a prolonged downturn in the housing market that has undermined household wealth.

China’s tech industries may be innovative with high productivity, but they may not generate many new jobs, said Eswar Prasad, a professor of economics and trade policy at Cornell University.

“AI is likely to lift productivity across the board but could have a severe disruptive effect on employment, worsening the employment growth problem and resulting in a detrimental effect on social stability,” he said.

[...]

Archived

Held in a Hong Kong prison without trial for the past five years, Chow Hang-tung has had few ways to communicate with the outside world. So when her partner, the Chinese dissident Ye Du, proposed to her by writing a letter, she was forced to respond in kind. “We really need to speed up the process of ending this dictatorship, otherwise when will we ever see each other again?” she wrote.

In 2021, Chow was charged with “inciting subversion” under a Beijing-imposed national security law, which also makes the promotion of Hong Kong’s secession from China a crime. On 21st August this year, she was convicted. She now faces up to ten years in prison.

[...]

Chow’s verdict comes amid an accelerating crackdown in Hong Kong, as authorities recently expanded the reach of the national security law, giving the region’s chief executive expanded powers to reclassify any criminal case as a matter of national security. While most of the democracy movement within Hong Kong has been dismantled or driven underground, Chow has remained a rare voice of open defiance.

When she was a child, her mother would take her to vigils in Hong Kong’s Victoria Park marking the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. Later in life, organising this annual vigil would land her and two fellow activists in detention.

[...]

In 2007, Chow received a postgraduate scholarship to study geophysics at Cambridge university, specialising in seismology. When an earthquake hit the Chinese region of Sichuan in 2008, she was frustrated by what she saw as the government’s role in worsening the impact of the natural disaster. It was then that Chow turned her attention to human rights, retraining and qualifying as a barrister in the mid-2010s.

Back in Hong Kong, she advocated for labourers in mainland China and built connections with Chinese dissidents.

[...]

She was sometimes criticised by fellow activists in the Hong Kong democracy movement for focusing on the rights of mainland dissidents over issues closer to home. But according to her friend, the activist Patrick Poon, Chow was “prophetic” in seeing how the experience of dissidents in China foreshadowed what was to happen in Hong Kong. While many of the movement’s leaders had fled abroad, he says Chow was determined to remain inside the region.

“What she saw and heard in mainland China made her realise more deeply that whether a society has freedom, rule of law and civil rights is not an abstract political concept, but directly affects the lives of every ordinary person,” her fiancé Ye Du tells me. He is barred from leaving China and has been placed under strict surveillance. The couple have not been able to communicate with each other since February last year.

One early morning in June 2021, police smashed down the door to her barrister’s chambers and arrested Chow. Despite the significant constraints of her detention, including limited access to legal resources, she chose to represent herself in court, sometimes using court submissions to turn the table on the legal system itself.

[...]

Chow, 41, sees few reasons to feel optimistic about the future of Hong Kong right now, she refuses to give up hope.

“No one can predict the future, but we should not lose our confidence in the people, who are where hope lies”, she says. “We should not underestimate the people’s resilience.”

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/58092995

Archived

Held in a Hong Kong prison without trial for the past five years, Chow Hang-tung has had few ways to communicate with the outside world. So when her partner, the Chinese dissident Ye Du, proposed to her by writing a letter, she was forced to respond in kind. “We really need to speed up the process of ending this dictatorship, otherwise when will we ever see each other again?” she wrote.

In 2021, Chow was charged with “inciting subversion” under a Beijing-imposed national security law, which also makes the promotion of Hong Kong’s secession from China a crime. On 21st August this year, she was convicted. She now faces up to ten years in prison.

[...]

Chow’s verdict comes amid an accelerating crackdown in Hong Kong, as authorities recently expanded the reach of the national security law, giving the region’s chief executive expanded powers to reclassify any criminal case as a matter of national security. While most of the democracy movement within Hong Kong has been dismantled or driven underground, Chow has remained a rare voice of open defiance.

When she was a child, her mother would take her to vigils in Hong Kong’s Victoria Park marking the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. Later in life, organising this annual vigil would land her and two fellow activists in detention.

[...]

In 2007, Chow received a postgraduate scholarship to study geophysics at Cambridge university, specialising in seismology. When an earthquake hit the Chinese region of Sichuan in 2008, she was frustrated by what she saw as the government’s role in worsening the impact of the natural disaster. It was then that Chow turned her attention to human rights, retraining and qualifying as a barrister in the mid-2010s.

Back in Hong Kong, she advocated for labourers in mainland China and built connections with Chinese dissidents.

[...]

She was sometimes criticised by fellow activists in the Hong Kong democracy movement for focusing on the rights of mainland dissidents over issues closer to home. But according to her friend, the activist Patrick Poon, Chow was “prophetic” in seeing how the experience of dissidents in China foreshadowed what was to happen in Hong Kong. While many of the movement’s leaders had fled abroad, he says Chow was determined to remain inside the region.

“What she saw and heard in mainland China made her realise more deeply that whether a society has freedom, rule of law and civil rights is not an abstract political concept, but directly affects the lives of every ordinary person,” her fiancé Ye Du tells me. He is barred from leaving China and has been placed under strict surveillance. The couple have not been able to communicate with each other since February last year.

One early morning in June 2021, police smashed down the door to her barrister’s chambers and arrested Chow. Despite the significant constraints of her detention, including limited access to legal resources, she chose to represent herself in court, sometimes using court submissions to turn the table on the legal system itself.

[...]

Chow, 41, sees few reasons to feel optimistic about the future of Hong Kong right now, she refuses to give up hope.

“No one can predict the future, but we should not lose our confidence in the people, who are where hope lies”, she says. “We should not underestimate the people’s resilience.”

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/58092995

Archived

Held in a Hong Kong prison without trial for the past five years, Chow Hang-tung has had few ways to communicate with the outside world. So when her partner, the Chinese dissident Ye Du, proposed to her by writing a letter, she was forced to respond in kind. “We really need to speed up the process of ending this dictatorship, otherwise when will we ever see each other again?” she wrote.

In 2021, Chow was charged with “inciting subversion” under a Beijing-imposed national security law, which also makes the promotion of Hong Kong’s secession from China a crime. On 21st August this year, she was convicted. She now faces up to ten years in prison.

[...]

Chow’s verdict comes amid an accelerating crackdown in Hong Kong, as authorities recently expanded the reach of the national security law, giving the region’s chief executive expanded powers to reclassify any criminal case as a matter of national security. While most of the democracy movement within Hong Kong has been dismantled or driven underground, Chow has remained a rare voice of open defiance.

When she was a child, her mother would take her to vigils in Hong Kong’s Victoria Park marking the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. Later in life, organising this annual vigil would land her and two fellow activists in detention.

[...]

In 2007, Chow received a postgraduate scholarship to study geophysics at Cambridge university, specialising in seismology. When an earthquake hit the Chinese region of Sichuan in 2008, she was frustrated by what she saw as the government’s role in worsening the impact of the natural disaster. It was then that Chow turned her attention to human rights, retraining and qualifying as a barrister in the mid-2010s.

Back in Hong Kong, she advocated for labourers in mainland China and built connections with Chinese dissidents.

[...]

She was sometimes criticised by fellow activists in the Hong Kong democracy movement for focusing on the rights of mainland dissidents over issues closer to home. But according to her friend, the activist Patrick Poon, Chow was “prophetic” in seeing how the experience of dissidents in China foreshadowed what was to happen in Hong Kong. While many of the movement’s leaders had fled abroad, he says Chow was determined to remain inside the region.

“What she saw and heard in mainland China made her realise more deeply that whether a society has freedom, rule of law and civil rights is not an abstract political concept, but directly affects the lives of every ordinary person,” her fiancé Ye Du tells me. He is barred from leaving China and has been placed under strict surveillance. The couple have not been able to communicate with each other since February last year.

One early morning in June 2021, police smashed down the door to her barrister’s chambers and arrested Chow. Despite the significant constraints of her detention, including limited access to legal resources, she chose to represent herself in court, sometimes using court submissions to turn the table on the legal system itself.

[...]

Chow, 41, sees few reasons to feel optimistic about the future of Hong Kong right now, she refuses to give up hope.

“No one can predict the future, but we should not lose our confidence in the people, who are where hope lies”, she says. “We should not underestimate the people’s resilience.”

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/58092678

Archived

[...]

Under China’s “AI Plus” initiative and its five-year plan through 2030, the government is pushing to infuse AI across many industries.

[...]

“What is specific to China is that the government is really into diffusing AI across the economy, so AI may get into different domains more quickly comparing to other countries,” said Zilan Qian, a research associate at Oxford China Policy Lab.

China’s economic growth has already been slowing. Consumer spending has lagged partly due to people becoming reluctant to spend because they’re worried about losing their jobs. It’s added to problems stemming from a prolonged downturn in the housing market that has undermined household wealth.

China’s tech industries may be innovative with high productivity, but they may not generate many new jobs, said Eswar Prasad, a professor of economics and trade policy at Cornell University.

“AI is likely to lift productivity across the board but could have a severe disruptive effect on employment, worsening the employment growth problem and resulting in a detrimental effect on social stability,” he said.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/58092678

Archived

[...]

Under China’s “AI Plus” initiative and its five-year plan through 2030, the government is pushing to infuse AI across many industries.

[...]

“What is specific to China is that the government is really into diffusing AI across the economy, so AI may get into different domains more quickly comparing to other countries,” said Zilan Qian, a research associate at Oxford China Policy Lab.

China’s economic growth has already been slowing. Consumer spending has lagged partly due to people becoming reluctant to spend because they’re worried about losing their jobs. It’s added to problems stemming from a prolonged downturn in the housing market that has undermined household wealth.

China’s tech industries may be innovative with high productivity, but they may not generate many new jobs, said Eswar Prasad, a professor of economics and trade policy at Cornell University.

“AI is likely to lift productivity across the board but could have a severe disruptive effect on employment, worsening the employment growth problem and resulting in a detrimental effect on social stability,” he said.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/58092678

Archived

[...]

Under China’s “AI Plus” initiative and its five-year plan through 2030, the government is pushing to infuse AI across many industries.

[...]

“What is specific to China is that the government is really into diffusing AI across the economy, so AI may get into different domains more quickly comparing to other countries,” said Zilan Qian, a research associate at Oxford China Policy Lab.

China’s economic growth has already been slowing. Consumer spending has lagged partly due to people becoming reluctant to spend because they’re worried about losing their jobs. It’s added to problems stemming from a prolonged downturn in the housing market that has undermined household wealth.

China’s tech industries may be innovative with high productivity, but they may not generate many new jobs, said Eswar Prasad, a professor of economics and trade policy at Cornell University.

“AI is likely to lift productivity across the board but could have a severe disruptive effect on employment, worsening the employment growth problem and resulting in a detrimental effect on social stability,” he said.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/58032842

Archived

Following the 10th anniversary of the South China Sea tribunal ruling [there is one] aspect of the ruling deserves attention: By failing to safeguard the marine environment of the South China Sea, China violated its obligations under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). This legacy of environmental degradation should inform assessments of whether China is prepared to serve as a responsible leader in similar institutions, as it gradually positions itself at the forefront of another landmark treaty under UNCLOS.

he Agreement on Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction (BBNJ), also known as the High Seas Treaty. entered into force globally on January 17, 2026.

[...]

In 2016, the tribunal concluded that China had failed “to protect and preserve the marine environment” of the South China Sea by constructing artificial islands and failing to prevent Chinese fishers from harvesting endangered and vulnerable marine species. In doing so, Beijing violated its obligations under Articles 192 and 194 of UNCLOS.

[...]

The tribunal’s first major environmental finding centered on China’s island-building activities. Through dredging and land filling, China had irreparably damaged approximately 3,170 acres of coral reefs by 2016. These processes involve cutter suction dredgers slicing through reef structures before pumping accumulated sediment via floating pipelines to create artificial islands. Entire reef ecosystems are effectively buried beneath the reclaimed land, and leftover sediment can float toward surrounding areas, killing other marine life.

Although China’s large-scale island-building campaign appeared to conclude around 2017, satellite imagery revealed dredging at Antelope Reef in the Paracel Islands beginning in October 2025. Measuring roughly 1,500 acres, the project is on pace to become China’s largest artificial island in the South China Sea. As a result, the estimated coral reef destruction caused by China’s island-building activities has now risen to approximately 6,224 acres—about half the size of Manhattan in New York City.

[...]

The tribunal’s second environmental finding concerned harmful fishing practices carried out by Chinese fishers. Giant clam harvesting was deemed “especially problematic” because of clams’ vital role in maintaining reef ecosystems and the destructive method used to extract them. Fishers drag specially designed brass propellers across coral reefs in semicircular patterns to expose buried clams, leaving behind distinct arc-shaped scars documented through satellite imagery. Despite supposed protection by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora from exploitation and illegal trade, the giant clam’s classification changed from “vulnerable” to “critically endangered” in 2024.

[...]

China’s island-building and giant clam harvesting activities have destroyed an estimated 22,759 acres of coral reef across the South China Sea.

[...]

China[...] has shown that it does not consistently follow established conventions under international law, ultimately weakens the principles of the BBNJ and global ocean governance as a whole.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/58032842

Archived

Following the 10th anniversary of the South China Sea tribunal ruling [there is one] aspect of the ruling deserves attention: By failing to safeguard the marine environment of the South China Sea, China violated its obligations under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). This legacy of environmental degradation should inform assessments of whether China is prepared to serve as a responsible leader in similar institutions, as it gradually positions itself at the forefront of another landmark treaty under UNCLOS.

he Agreement on Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction (BBNJ), also known as the High Seas Treaty. entered into force globally on January 17, 2026.

[...]

In 2016, the tribunal concluded that China had failed “to protect and preserve the marine environment” of the South China Sea by constructing artificial islands and failing to prevent Chinese fishers from harvesting endangered and vulnerable marine species. In doing so, Beijing violated its obligations under Articles 192 and 194 of UNCLOS.

[...]

The tribunal’s first major environmental finding centered on China’s island-building activities. Through dredging and land filling, China had irreparably damaged approximately 3,170 acres of coral reefs by 2016. These processes involve cutter suction dredgers slicing through reef structures before pumping accumulated sediment via floating pipelines to create artificial islands. Entire reef ecosystems are effectively buried beneath the reclaimed land, and leftover sediment can float toward surrounding areas, killing other marine life.

Although China’s large-scale island-building campaign appeared to conclude around 2017, satellite imagery revealed dredging at Antelope Reef in the Paracel Islands beginning in October 2025. Measuring roughly 1,500 acres, the project is on pace to become China’s largest artificial island in the South China Sea. As a result, the estimated coral reef destruction caused by China’s island-building activities has now risen to approximately 6,224 acres—about half the size of Manhattan in New York City.

[...]

The tribunal’s second environmental finding concerned harmful fishing practices carried out by Chinese fishers. Giant clam harvesting was deemed “especially problematic” because of clams’ vital role in maintaining reef ecosystems and the destructive method used to extract them. Fishers drag specially designed brass propellers across coral reefs in semicircular patterns to expose buried clams, leaving behind distinct arc-shaped scars documented through satellite imagery. Despite supposed protection by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora from exploitation and illegal trade, the giant clam’s classification changed from “vulnerable” to “critically endangered” in 2024.

[...]

China’s island-building and giant clam harvesting activities have destroyed an estimated 22,759 acres of coral reef across the South China Sea.

[...]

China[...] has shown that it does not consistently follow established conventions under international law, ultimately weakens the principles of the BBNJ and global ocean governance as a whole.

[...]

Archived

Following the 10th anniversary of the South China Sea tribunal ruling [there is one] aspect of the ruling deserves attention: By failing to safeguard the marine environment of the South China Sea, China violated its obligations under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). This legacy of environmental degradation should inform assessments of whether China is prepared to serve as a responsible leader in similar institutions, as it gradually positions itself at the forefront of another landmark treaty under UNCLOS.

he Agreement on Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction (BBNJ), also known as the High Seas Treaty. entered into force globally on January 17, 2026.

[...]

In 2016, the tribunal concluded that China had failed “to protect and preserve the marine environment” of the South China Sea by constructing artificial islands and failing to prevent Chinese fishers from harvesting endangered and vulnerable marine species. In doing so, Beijing violated its obligations under Articles 192 and 194 of UNCLOS.

[...]

The tribunal’s first major environmental finding centered on China’s island-building activities. Through dredging and land filling, China had irreparably damaged approximately 3,170 acres of coral reefs by 2016. These processes involve cutter suction dredgers slicing through reef structures before pumping accumulated sediment via floating pipelines to create artificial islands. Entire reef ecosystems are effectively buried beneath the reclaimed land, and leftover sediment can float toward surrounding areas, killing other marine life.

Although China’s large-scale island-building campaign appeared to conclude around 2017, satellite imagery revealed dredging at Antelope Reef in the Paracel Islands beginning in October 2025. Measuring roughly 1,500 acres, the project is on pace to become China’s largest artificial island in the South China Sea. As a result, the estimated coral reef destruction caused by China’s island-building activities has now risen to approximately 6,224 acres—about half the size of Manhattan in New York City.

[...]

The tribunal’s second environmental finding concerned harmful fishing practices carried out by Chinese fishers. Giant clam harvesting was deemed “especially problematic” because of clams’ vital role in maintaining reef ecosystems and the destructive method used to extract them. Fishers drag specially designed brass propellers across coral reefs in semicircular patterns to expose buried clams, leaving behind distinct arc-shaped scars documented through satellite imagery. Despite supposed protection by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora from exploitation and illegal trade, the giant clam’s classification changed from “vulnerable” to “critically endangered” in 2024.

[...]

China’s island-building and giant clam harvesting activities have destroyed an estimated 22,759 acres of coral reef across the South China Sea.

[...]

China[...] has shown that it does not consistently follow established conventions under international law, ultimately weakens the principles of the BBNJ and global ocean governance as a whole.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/57897368

Archived

[...]

Hong Kong’s High Court today convicted Tiananmen activists Chow Hang-tung and Lee Cheuk-yan of “inciting subversion of state power” under the city’s National Security Law. Chow and Lee, along with Albert Ho Chun-yan, who previously pleaded guilty to the same charge, will be sentenced at a later date and face up to 10 years’ imprisonment.

Chow and Lee were among seven members of the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China (Hong Kong Alliance) charged with different offences under the Beijing-imposed law in September 2021. Both have been held in pre-trial detention ever since, having been repeatedly denied bail. They have been designated prisoners of conscience by Amnesty International.

[...]

“This dismaying verdict underlines how Hong Kong’s National Security Law is being used to punish people for peacefully remembering one of the darkest chapters in recent Chinese history," says Amnesty International Hong Kong Overseas spokesperson Fernando Cheung.

“For decades, Hong Kong was the only place on Chinese soil where large-scale public remembrance of the Tiananmen crackdown could take place. Today’s decision marks another grim milestone in the government’s deliberate campaign to erase that legacy and silence those who seek truth, justice and accountability.

[...]

Amnesty International’s Deputy Regional Director Sarah Brooks described Chow Hang-tung and Lee Cheuk-yan as "prisoners of conscience" and urged the authorities to quash the convictions.

“Chow Hang-tung and Lee Cheuk-yan have not committed any recognizable crime; they have been convicted solely for their role in organizing peaceful commemorations of the people killed by the Chinese authorities on 4 June 1989, " Brooks said.

"They must be released immediately and unconditionally.”

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/57897582

• Indonesia recorded 96 allegations of human rights and environmental abuses linked to Chinese investments in transition minerals from 2023 to 2025, the most of any country, with 90 involving nickel, according to a new report.
• Water, soil, and air pollution were among the main environmental concerns, while Indonesian nickel processors accounted for 57% of work-related deaths and 68% of injury allegations documented globally.
• The report also documented allegations involving Indigenous rights violations, intimidation of environmental defenders, and failures to obtain free, prior, and informed consent around nickel projects in Indonesia.
• The Business & Human Rights Resource Centre, which compiled the report, says Chinese companies need stronger human rights and environmental due diligence, as gaps between corporate commitments and practices could create growing risks for workers, communities, and supply chains.

Archived

Indonesia recorded more allegations of human rights and environmental abuses linked to Chinese investments in transition minerals than any other country between 2023 and 2025, a new report says. It identifies the vast majority of problems with the country’s rapidly expanding nickel industry.

The report by the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre (BHRC), Shifting ground - Human rights, Chinese investment and the rush for transition minerals (pdf), documented 323 publicly reported allegations across 24 countries during the three-year period, plus three confidential cases involving attacks on human rights defenders. That brings the total to 326 allegations for 2023-2025.

The number of recorded allegations has also risen each year, from 51 in 2021 to 148 in 2025, bringing the five-year total to 434. That increase doesn’t necessarily mean the number of abuses themselves have tripled, as changes in reporting, monitoring, and the database can affect the figures.

[...]

Still, the rising trend comes as investment in the minerals used in electric vehicles, batteries, and renewable energy technologies expands rapidly, raising risks for workers, Indigenous peoples, local communities, and the environment.

The report also documented 18 attacks against human rights defenders across all 24 countries between 2023 and 2025, including cases involving judicial harassment, violence, and intimidation.

[...]

Of the 323 allegations analyzed in detail, 96 were in Indonesia, the highest of any country. The Democratic Republic of Congo was second with 52, followed by Myanmar with 36, Serbia with 32, and Zimbabwe with 20.

Ninety of the 96 Indonesian allegations involved nickel. Of those, 71 concerned nickel processing, 17 nickel extraction, and two project development. Overall, 73 of the 96 Indonesian allegations occurred during processing, smelting or refining.

The concentration in processing is notable because, globally, extraction accounted for the majority of allegations.

Three major nickel hubs — the Indonesia Morowali Industrial Park (IMIP), Indonesia Weda Bay Industrial Park (IWIP), and nickel projects on Obi Island — together accounted for 59 allegations, or about 61% of the Indonesian total.

[...]

Water pollution was the most frequently recorded environmental impact globally, with 102 allegations, followed by soil pollution (69), air pollution (55), violations of environmental safety standards (54), access to water (51), and impact assessment failures (32).

In Indonesia, nickel-processing operations accounted for 22 allegations involving water pollution, 14 involving air pollution, and nine involving soil pollution.

[...]

Indonesia’s nickel-processing boom generates not only environmental risks but also a disproportionate share of the worker deaths and injuries documented across Chinese-linked transition mineral projects globally.

BHRC recorded 25 allegations involving worker injuries and 47 involving work-related deaths worldwide. Of those, Indonesian nickel processors accounted for 17 injury allegations (68% of the global total) and 27 death allegations, or 57% of the global toll.

[...]

Problems can begin before a mine or processing facility even starts operating, as Indigenous peoples and local communities seek to protect their land, livelihoods, and traditional ways of life.

BHRC documented eight allegations in Indonesia involving failures to respect Indigenous peoples’ right to free, prior and informed consent, or FPIC. The report cited allegations affecting the Hongana Manyawa and Bajau peoples, including land dispossession, degradation of their living environment, and loss of traditional livelihoods and cultural ties.

[...]

Global demand for transition minerals continues to grow as countries race to build renewable energy and electric vehicle supply chains. Major companies from the U.S., the European Union, and elsewhere are seeking to secure critical mineral supplies from resource-rich countries such as Indonesia [...] China’s role also gives its companies an opportunity to improve human rights and community engagement across the mining supply chain, BHRC executive director Michael Clements said.

But the report found a gap between Chinese corporate policies and practices on the ground.

[...]

Ten companies accounted for 65% of the 323 allegations in the report. The top three were Zijin Mining, with 49 allegations; Tsingshan, with 42; and Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt, with 22. Together, they accounted for 113 allegations, or more than a third of the total.

The finding is notable because Zijin Mining and Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt both have publicly available human rights policies, raising questions about how effectively such policies are being implemented.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/57844000

For decades, the West assumed that economic growth would turn China into a more open, liberal society, much as it did Taiwan and South Korea. Instead, China’s totalitarian institutions proved remarkably resilient, surviving decades of reform and reasserting themselves under Xi Jinping.

[Op-ed by Chenggang Xu, senior research fellow at the Stanford Center on China’s Economy and Institutions at Stanford University, and the author of "Institutional Genes: Origins of China’s Institutions and Totalitarianism".]

Archived

[...]

“Totalitarian,” it is important to note, is not a pejorative label. It describes a distinct institutional structure. If China is seen merely as a rising power, the challenge appears to be one of great-power competition, inviting accommodation and compromise. If it is viewed as a strictly authoritarian regime, the problem is one of political repression, with gradual reform offering a possible remedy. However, if China is a communist totalitarian system, then its domestic institutional structure necessarily shapes its external behavior, with profound implications for its role within the international order.

The distinction between totalitarianism and authoritarianism is not just semantic. A totalitarian party is not a political party in the conventional sense. It is an organization designed to penetrate and control the state, the bureaucracy, the economy, the media, (coercive) institutions, personnel, ideology, social organizations and even private life.

By contrast, authoritarian regimes try to monopolize political power, suppress opposition and restrict civil liberties, but might leave significant parts of society relatively autonomous. This limited pluralism can foster economic growth and an expanding middle class, which can in turn lead to liberalization and, eventually, democracy. South Korea and Taiwan are prime examples.

[...]

What accounts for the remarkable persistence of Chinese totalitarianism? The answer lies in “institutional genes”: recurring institutional elements that enable a political system to reproduce itself over time. The most important of these elements concern the distribution of power and property rights, and the prevailing social consensus that legitimizes this distribution. Because these elements sustain the larger structure of power, those who benefit from it have strong incentives to preserve and reproduce them.

[...]

The critical question is not who owns a particular asset, but who ultimately controls land, capital, labor and information. Such arrangements are reproduced through incentives, coercion, ideology and organizational power. While they can and do change, new policies or reformist declarations alone are rarely enough to dislodge them.

Taiwan offers the clearest example. It is an ethnically Chinese society with deep historical and cultural ties to mainland China, yet it became a constitutional democracy ... Its continued development contributed to the emergence of civil society and growing demands for political reform.

[...]

By framing China as a normal rising power and the US as a nervous incumbent, he [Xi Jinping] seeks to focus global attention on preventing a great-power conflict, rather than on harder questions about the nature of China’s totalitarian system and what its ascendancy would mean for the world.

How democracies understand China determines how they deal with it. Misreading the nature of the regime can lead them to treat China as an ordinary great power, mistake tactical accommodation for genuine liberalization and confuse economic integration with political moderation.

[...]

China’s experience shows why the origins and resilience of political systems matter — and why even far-reaching reforms might fail to transform them. However, history is not destiny. Institutions change when the forces that reinforce them change. Although China is not condemned by its past, its future depends on whether the institutions that have defined its political order for generations finally give way to something new. **The first step is to recognize its totalitarian regime for what it is. **

Over the past decade, Beijing has ramped up its media presence in Türkiye, which is home to a large diaspora of Uyghurs, a minority severely oppressed in China. The Turkish information space is now increasingly injected with narratives that whitewash stories from East Turkestan, a territory controlled by China — which Beijing calls “Xinjiang province” — which is the epicentre of human rights abuses against Uyghurs. The Uyghur community in Türkiye fears China’s growing influence will silence their reports and push their voices out of public debate.

Archived

Since 2016, the Chinese regime has been conducting a violent campaign of repression in East Turkistan against the Uyghurs, a Turkic-speaking minority group who are often falsely accused of extremism and separatism by Beijing. International observers have characterised the situation as a “genocide” and denounced “crimes against humanity.”

[...]

Many Uyghurs have fled to Türkiye, where the Uyghur Human Rights Project estimates there is a diaspora of 50,000 people.

[...]

The more China dominates Türkiye’s media space, the harder it is to alert Turkish citizens to the plight of Uyghurs in Türkiye. “As Beijing’s narratives become more present in Turkish-language media, the risk is that critical voices — particularly Uyghur journalists and activists — may find themselves increasingly difficult to be heard,” said Uyghur writer Hamid Gokturk, founder of the Türkiye-based online media UyghurNet. “Not because alternative information does not exist, but because the resources behind competing narratives are highly unequal.”

[...]

"In Türkiye, the increasing prominence of Chinese state narratives risks erasing independent reporting on the Uyghur genocide and depriving the public of the ability to hear directly from those affected," says Aleksandra Bielakowska, Advocacy Manager at RSF's Asia-Pacific Bureau.

"The danger is not only that Beijing’s narratives are spreading in Türkiye, but that Uyghur voices are being pushed out of the conversation altogether. When propaganda dominates an information environment, those documenting persecution risk becoming invisible."

[...]

The CCP has steadily expanded its presence in Türkiye’s information space through a combination of international state broadcasters, local partnerships, sponsored content and social media ... Today, a magazine showcasing China's economic development, culture and official narratives. In 2016, state broadcaster China Radio International (CRI) launched its Turkish service CRI Türk, which was later restructured as CGTN Türk in 2023.

[...]

Chinese state outlets such as Xinhua News Agency and CRI developed partnerships and content-sharing agreements to adapt their pro-Beijing content to Turkish audiences. For instance, the media group GB Times, which is fully funded by CRI, opened GB Times Türkiye in 2013, which signed agreements with local radio stations to allocate dedicated timeslots for CRI’s Turkish programmes, and launched the Turkish-language service of CTV (China Television) in 2014.

Anadolu Agency, Türkiye’s state-run national news agency, signed a formal cooperation agreement with Xinhua News Agency in 2018. That same year, the Turkish Radio and Television Corporation (TRT), which had been cooperating on content with the state-run television network China Central Television (CCTV) since 2010, entered into similar partnerships with the China Media Group (CMG) and CGTN.

[...]

On social media, CGTN Türk (3.8M combined followers on its Turkish-language accounts), Xinhua Türkiye (103M) and the Chinese Embassy in Türkiye (70.8k) all actively post about East Turkestan's economic development as well as assertions that "China respects religious freedom" and that the "vocational education centres in Xinjiang are not detention camps." With 38 million followers across X, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and TikTok, these accounts also criticise Western media for spreading misinformation about Xinjiang and Uyghurs.

[...]

In parallel, the Chinese regime attempts to intimidate Uyghur diaspora journalists into self-censorship. ”These tactics can include surveillance, online harassment, pressure on family members who remain in East Turkestan, attempts to collect personal information, and digital threats," Uyghur journalist and vice president of the Istiklal Media Group, Muhammed Ali Atayurt told RSF. This transnational repression makes it clear that Chinese state media are not merely presenting an alternative point of view, but deliberately attempting to drown out Uyghur voices.

[...]

Türkiye ranks 163rd out of 180 countries in the 2026 RSF World Press Freedom Index. China ranks 178th and remains the world’s largest jailer of journalists, with 121 currently detained.

• Indonesia recorded 96 allegations of human rights and environmental abuses linked to Chinese investments in transition minerals from 2023 to 2025, the most of any country, with 90 involving nickel, according to a new report.
• Water, soil, and air pollution were among the main environmental concerns, while Indonesian nickel processors accounted for 57% of work-related deaths and 68% of injury allegations documented globally.
• The report also documented allegations involving Indigenous rights violations, intimidation of environmental defenders, and failures to obtain free, prior, and informed consent around nickel projects in Indonesia.
• The Business & Human Rights Resource Centre, which compiled the report, says Chinese companies need stronger human rights and environmental due diligence, as gaps between corporate commitments and practices could create growing risks for workers, communities, and supply chains.

Archived

Indonesia recorded more allegations of human rights and environmental abuses linked to Chinese investments in transition minerals than any other country between 2023 and 2025, a new report says. It identifies the vast majority of problems with the country’s rapidly expanding nickel industry.

The report by the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre (BHRC), Shifting ground - Human rights, Chinese investment and the rush for transition minerals (pdf), documented 323 publicly reported allegations across 24 countries during the three-year period, plus three confidential cases involving attacks on human rights defenders. That brings the total to 326 allegations for 2023-2025.

The number of recorded allegations has also risen each year, from 51 in 2021 to 148 in 2025, bringing the five-year total to 434. That increase doesn’t necessarily mean the number of abuses themselves have tripled, as changes in reporting, monitoring, and the database can affect the figures.

[...]

Still, the rising trend comes as investment in the minerals used in electric vehicles, batteries, and renewable energy technologies expands rapidly, raising risks for workers, Indigenous peoples, local communities, and the environment.

The report also documented 18 attacks against human rights defenders across all 24 countries between 2023 and 2025, including cases involving judicial harassment, violence, and intimidation.

[...]

Of the 323 allegations analyzed in detail, 96 were in Indonesia, the highest of any country. The Democratic Republic of Congo was second with 52, followed by Myanmar with 36, Serbia with 32, and Zimbabwe with 20.

Ninety of the 96 Indonesian allegations involved nickel. Of those, 71 concerned nickel processing, 17 nickel extraction, and two project development. Overall, 73 of the 96 Indonesian allegations occurred during processing, smelting or refining.

The concentration in processing is notable because, globally, extraction accounted for the majority of allegations.

Three major nickel hubs — the Indonesia Morowali Industrial Park (IMIP), Indonesia Weda Bay Industrial Park (IWIP), and nickel projects on Obi Island — together accounted for 59 allegations, or about 61% of the Indonesian total.

[...]

Water pollution was the most frequently recorded environmental impact globally, with 102 allegations, followed by soil pollution (69), air pollution (55), violations of environmental safety standards (54), access to water (51), and impact assessment failures (32).

In Indonesia, nickel-processing operations accounted for 22 allegations involving water pollution, 14 involving air pollution, and nine involving soil pollution.

[...]

Indonesia’s nickel-processing boom generates not only environmental risks but also a disproportionate share of the worker deaths and injuries documented across Chinese-linked transition mineral projects globally.

BHRC recorded 25 allegations involving worker injuries and 47 involving work-related deaths worldwide. Of those, Indonesian nickel processors accounted for 17 injury allegations (68% of the global total) and 27 death allegations, or 57% of the global toll.

[...]

Problems can begin before a mine or processing facility even starts operating, as Indigenous peoples and local communities seek to protect their land, livelihoods, and traditional ways of life.

BHRC documented eight allegations in Indonesia involving failures to respect Indigenous peoples’ right to free, prior and informed consent, or FPIC. The report cited allegations affecting the Hongana Manyawa and Bajau peoples, including land dispossession, degradation of their living environment, and loss of traditional livelihoods and cultural ties.

[...]

Global demand for transition minerals continues to grow as countries race to build renewable energy and electric vehicle supply chains. Major companies from the U.S., the European Union, and elsewhere are seeking to secure critical mineral supplies from resource-rich countries such as Indonesia [...] China’s role also gives its companies an opportunity to improve human rights and community engagement across the mining supply chain, BHRC executive director Michael Clements said.

But the report found a gap between Chinese corporate policies and practices on the ground.

[...]

Ten companies accounted for 65% of the 323 allegations in the report. The top three were Zijin Mining, with 49 allegations; Tsingshan, with 42; and Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt, with 22. Together, they accounted for 113 allegations, or more than a third of the total.

The finding is notable because Zijin Mining and Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt both have publicly available human rights policies, raising questions about how effectively such policies are being implemented.

[...]

Archived

[...]

Hong Kong’s High Court today convicted Tiananmen activists Chow Hang-tung and Lee Cheuk-yan of “inciting subversion of state power” under the city’s National Security Law. Chow and Lee, along with Albert Ho Chun-yan, who previously pleaded guilty to the same charge, will be sentenced at a later date and face up to 10 years’ imprisonment.

Chow and Lee were among seven members of the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China (Hong Kong Alliance) charged with different offences under the Beijing-imposed law in September 2021. Both have been held in pre-trial detention ever since, having been repeatedly denied bail. They have been designated prisoners of conscience by Amnesty International.

[...]

“This dismaying verdict underlines how Hong Kong’s National Security Law is being used to punish people for peacefully remembering one of the darkest chapters in recent Chinese history," says Amnesty International Hong Kong Overseas spokesperson Fernando Cheung.

“For decades, Hong Kong was the only place on Chinese soil where large-scale public remembrance of the Tiananmen crackdown could take place. Today’s decision marks another grim milestone in the government’s deliberate campaign to erase that legacy and silence those who seek truth, justice and accountability.

[...]

Amnesty International’s Deputy Regional Director Sarah Brooks described Chow Hang-tung and Lee Cheuk-yan as "prisoners of conscience" and urged the authorities to quash the convictions.

“Chow Hang-tung and Lee Cheuk-yan have not committed any recognizable crime; they have been convicted solely for their role in organizing peaceful commemorations of the people killed by the Chinese authorities on 4 June 1989, " Brooks said.

"They must be released immediately and unconditionally.”

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/57897582

• Indonesia recorded 96 allegations of human rights and environmental abuses linked to Chinese investments in transition minerals from 2023 to 2025, the most of any country, with 90 involving nickel, according to a new report.
• Water, soil, and air pollution were among the main environmental concerns, while Indonesian nickel processors accounted for 57% of work-related deaths and 68% of injury allegations documented globally.
• The report also documented allegations involving Indigenous rights violations, intimidation of environmental defenders, and failures to obtain free, prior, and informed consent around nickel projects in Indonesia.
• The Business & Human Rights Resource Centre, which compiled the report, says Chinese companies need stronger human rights and environmental due diligence, as gaps between corporate commitments and practices could create growing risks for workers, communities, and supply chains.

Archived

Indonesia recorded more allegations of human rights and environmental abuses linked to Chinese investments in transition minerals than any other country between 2023 and 2025, a new report says. It identifies the vast majority of problems with the country’s rapidly expanding nickel industry.

The report by the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre (BHRC), Shifting ground - Human rights, Chinese investment and the rush for transition minerals (pdf), documented 323 publicly reported allegations across 24 countries during the three-year period, plus three confidential cases involving attacks on human rights defenders. That brings the total to 326 allegations for 2023-2025.

The number of recorded allegations has also risen each year, from 51 in 2021 to 148 in 2025, bringing the five-year total to 434. That increase doesn’t necessarily mean the number of abuses themselves have tripled, as changes in reporting, monitoring, and the database can affect the figures.

[...]

Still, the rising trend comes as investment in the minerals used in electric vehicles, batteries, and renewable energy technologies expands rapidly, raising risks for workers, Indigenous peoples, local communities, and the environment.

The report also documented 18 attacks against human rights defenders across all 24 countries between 2023 and 2025, including cases involving judicial harassment, violence, and intimidation.

[...]

Of the 323 allegations analyzed in detail, 96 were in Indonesia, the highest of any country. The Democratic Republic of Congo was second with 52, followed by Myanmar with 36, Serbia with 32, and Zimbabwe with 20.

Ninety of the 96 Indonesian allegations involved nickel. Of those, 71 concerned nickel processing, 17 nickel extraction, and two project development. Overall, 73 of the 96 Indonesian allegations occurred during processing, smelting or refining.

The concentration in processing is notable because, globally, extraction accounted for the majority of allegations.

Three major nickel hubs — the Indonesia Morowali Industrial Park (IMIP), Indonesia Weda Bay Industrial Park (IWIP), and nickel projects on Obi Island — together accounted for 59 allegations, or about 61% of the Indonesian total.

[...]

Water pollution was the most frequently recorded environmental impact globally, with 102 allegations, followed by soil pollution (69), air pollution (55), violations of environmental safety standards (54), access to water (51), and impact assessment failures (32).

In Indonesia, nickel-processing operations accounted for 22 allegations involving water pollution, 14 involving air pollution, and nine involving soil pollution.

[...]

Indonesia’s nickel-processing boom generates not only environmental risks but also a disproportionate share of the worker deaths and injuries documented across Chinese-linked transition mineral projects globally.

BHRC recorded 25 allegations involving worker injuries and 47 involving work-related deaths worldwide. Of those, Indonesian nickel processors accounted for 17 injury allegations (68% of the global total) and 27 death allegations, or 57% of the global toll.

[...]

Problems can begin before a mine or processing facility even starts operating, as Indigenous peoples and local communities seek to protect their land, livelihoods, and traditional ways of life.

BHRC documented eight allegations in Indonesia involving failures to respect Indigenous peoples’ right to free, prior and informed consent, or FPIC. The report cited allegations affecting the Hongana Manyawa and Bajau peoples, including land dispossession, degradation of their living environment, and loss of traditional livelihoods and cultural ties.

[...]

Global demand for transition minerals continues to grow as countries race to build renewable energy and electric vehicle supply chains. Major companies from the U.S., the European Union, and elsewhere are seeking to secure critical mineral supplies from resource-rich countries such as Indonesia [...] China’s role also gives its companies an opportunity to improve human rights and community engagement across the mining supply chain, BHRC executive director Michael Clements said.

But the report found a gap between Chinese corporate policies and practices on the ground.

[...]

Ten companies accounted for 65% of the 323 allegations in the report. The top three were Zijin Mining, with 49 allegations; Tsingshan, with 42; and Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt, with 22. Together, they accounted for 113 allegations, or more than a third of the total.

The finding is notable because Zijin Mining and Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt both have publicly available human rights policies, raising questions about how effectively such policies are being implemented.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/57813348

Over the past decade, Beijing has ramped up its media presence in Türkiye, which is home to a large diaspora of Uyghurs, a minority severely oppressed in China. The Turkish information space is now increasingly injected with narratives that whitewash stories from East Turkestan, a territory controlled by China — which Beijing calls “Xinjiang province” — which is the epicentre of human rights abuses against Uyghurs. The Uyghur community in Türkiye fears China’s growing influence will silence their reports and push their voices out of public debate.

Archived

Since 2016, the Chinese regime has been conducting a violent campaign of repression in East Turkistan against the Uyghurs, a Turkic-speaking minority group who are often falsely accused of extremism and separatism by Beijing. International observers have characterised the situation as a “genocide” and denounced “crimes against humanity.”

[...]

Many Uyghurs have fled to Türkiye, where the Uyghur Human Rights Project estimates there is a diaspora of 50,000 people.

[...]

The more China dominates Türkiye’s media space, the harder it is to alert Turkish citizens to the plight of Uyghurs in Türkiye. “As Beijing’s narratives become more present in Turkish-language media, the risk is that critical voices — particularly Uyghur journalists and activists — may find themselves increasingly difficult to be heard,” said Uyghur writer Hamid Gokturk, founder of the Türkiye-based online media UyghurNet. “Not because alternative information does not exist, but because the resources behind competing narratives are highly unequal.”

[...]

"In Türkiye, the increasing prominence of Chinese state narratives risks erasing independent reporting on the Uyghur genocide and depriving the public of the ability to hear directly from those affected," says Aleksandra Bielakowska, Advocacy Manager at RSF's Asia-Pacific Bureau.

"The danger is not only that Beijing’s narratives are spreading in Türkiye, but that Uyghur voices are being pushed out of the conversation altogether. When propaganda dominates an information environment, those documenting persecution risk becoming invisible."

[...]

The CCP has steadily expanded its presence in Türkiye’s information space through a combination of international state broadcasters, local partnerships, sponsored content and social media ... Today, a magazine showcasing China's economic development, culture and official narratives. In 2016, state broadcaster China Radio International (CRI) launched its Turkish service CRI Türk, which was later restructured as CGTN Türk in 2023.

[...]

Chinese state outlets such as Xinhua News Agency and CRI developed partnerships and content-sharing agreements to adapt their pro-Beijing content to Turkish audiences. For instance, the media group GB Times, which is fully funded by CRI, opened GB Times Türkiye in 2013, which signed agreements with local radio stations to allocate dedicated timeslots for CRI’s Turkish programmes, and launched the Turkish-language service of CTV (China Television) in 2014.

Anadolu Agency, Türkiye’s state-run national news agency, signed a formal cooperation agreement with Xinhua News Agency in 2018. That same year, the Turkish Radio and Television Corporation (TRT), which had been cooperating on content with the state-run television network China Central Television (CCTV) since 2010, entered into similar partnerships with the China Media Group (CMG) and CGTN.

[...]

On social media, CGTN Türk (3.8M combined followers on its Turkish-language accounts), Xinhua Türkiye (103M) and the Chinese Embassy in Türkiye (70.8k) all actively post about East Turkestan's economic development as well as assertions that "China respects religious freedom" and that the "vocational education centres in Xinjiang are not detention camps." With 38 million followers across X, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and TikTok, these accounts also criticise Western media for spreading misinformation about Xinjiang and Uyghurs.

[...]

In parallel, the Chinese regime attempts to intimidate Uyghur diaspora journalists into self-censorship. ”These tactics can include surveillance, online harassment, pressure on family members who remain in East Turkestan, attempts to collect personal information, and digital threats," Uyghur journalist and vice president of the Istiklal Media Group, Muhammed Ali Atayurt told RSF. This transnational repression makes it clear that Chinese state media are not merely presenting an alternative point of view, but deliberately attempting to drown out Uyghur voices.

[...]

Türkiye ranks 163rd out of 180 countries in the 2026 RSF World Press Freedom Index. China ranks 178th and remains the world’s largest jailer of journalists, with 121 currently detained.