Viewpoint
01.22.24

Beijing Is Pouring Resources into Its UN Human Rights Review—All to Prevent Any Real Review from Taking Place

Sophie Richardson & Rana Siu Inboden

On January 23, a large delegation of Chinese officials will appear at the United Nations Human Rights Council (HRC) to try to defend the indefensible. For the first time since 2018, China will undergo a Universal Periodic Review (UPR), in which...

Viewpoint
12.20.23

Hong Kong Finds Its Voice at the UN—And Uses It to Cheerlead for Beijing

Anouk Wear

Last May, in a meeting room at the United Nations in Geneva, I sat and listened as a delegate from my hometown of Hong Kong called me a liar. I was there as a representative from the civil society organization Hong Kong Watch, participating in a...

Viewpoint
02.27.23

How Much Does U.S.-China Tension Threaten Decarbonization?

Scott Moore

A striking contradiction has emerged between Beijing’s growing geopolitical isolation on one hand, and its apparent continued commitment to tackling global climate change on the other. The big question, for China and for the world, is whether...

Conversation
09.09.22

Could China’s Very Hot Summer Revive Action on Climate Change?

Ilaria Mazzocco, Lauri Myllyvirta & more

For more than two months, China—along with the rest of the globe—has been struggling with extreme heat and severe droughts. Hundreds of cities are facing temperatures in the 90s and higher, and Beijing last month issued its first nationwide...

Conversation
05.19.20

What Are the Right and the Wrong Ways for the U.S. to Support Taiwan?

Daniel R. Russel, Yu-Jie Chen & more

What are the right and wrong ways for the U.S. to support Taiwan? Traditionally, America’s goals have been to deter the mainland from aggression and coercion, support Taiwan’s democratic system, strengthen economic ties, and help it maintain...

Conversation
05.09.20

How Will China Shape Global Governance?

Jeremy Youde, Melanie Hart & more

How is the Trump administration’s contempt for, and retreat from, multilateral bodies affecting China’s position and weight within them—or indeed its overall strategy for relations with these organizations? Do China’s leaders aspire to supplant...

Books
03.12.20

China and Intervention at the UN Security Council

Courtney Fung

Understanding the impact and scope of conditions of status answers why China has taken certain positions regarding intervention and how these positions were justified.

Viewpoint
01.14.20

Why Aren’t More Countries Confronting China over Xinjiang?

Matt Schiavenza

China has justified its repressive actions in Xinjiang as a response to a series of terror attacks attributed to Uighurs. But the measures Chinese authorities have employed have attracted international condemnation. In July, the United Nations...

Viewpoint
01.09.19

Normalization of Sino-American Relations: 40 Years Later

Jerome A. Cohen

The spirited 2019 New Year’s speeches of Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen and China’s President Xi Jinping have just reminded the world that, 40 years after the normalization of relations between the United States and China, the...

Features
01.08.19

Where Did the One Million Figure for Detentions in Xinjiang’s Camps Come From?

Jessica Batke

As journalists and scholars have reported in recent months on the campaign of religious and cultural repression and incarceration taking place in the Chinese region of Xinjiang, a central question has emerged: How many people has China’s...

11.30.18

How Outsiders View ‘Civil Society,’ the Stages of Chinese Charity, and Partnering with Domestic NGOs

Several of the recommendations made during the UN Human Rights Council’s recent Universal Periodic Review of China’s human rights record pertain to civil society and NGOs. Bin Xu, Assistant Professor of Sociology at Emory University, discusses...

07.26.18

Recent NGO-Related News

The policy environment for domestic NGOs; the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals; foreign NGOs and Taiwan; and the #MeToo movement. . .

Behind China's Attempt to Ease the Rohingya Crisis

Beijing strenuously avoids playing a high-profile part in ameliorating international humanitarian crises. Its most identifiable role in Myanmar had been to shield the local military from international criticism for carrying out what the United...

Viewpoint
09.24.17

China, Global Peacemaker?

James Bowen

In May, Chinese President Xi Jinping gave opening remarks to a two-day international forum designed to demystify and attract support for...

Conversation
09.21.17

What Will China Do if the U.S. Attacks North Korea?

Shen Dingli, Bonnie S. Glaser & more

During a speech at the United Nations General Assembly on September 19, U.S. President Donald Trump warned...

Why China Won’t Pressure North Korea as Much as Trump Wants

At the center of the North Korean nuclear crisis is a pivotal question: How much is China really willing to pressure and punish its longtime ally in Pyongyang? Recent conversations in Beijing and Washington suggest that Chinese leaders have...

The Costs of International Advocacy

Human Rights Watch

Even as it engages with U.N. human rights institutions, China has worked consistently and often aggressively to silence criticism of its human rights record before U.N. bodies and has taken actions aimed at weakening some of the central...

Conversation
08.10.17

Should China Support the U.S. in a War with North Korea?

Ryan Hass, Susan Shirk & more

On August 9, U.S. President Donald Trump warned North Korea that if it does not stop threatening the United States, it will be “met with fire and fury and frankly power, the likes of which this world has never seen before.” Just hours later, the...

China Warns U.S. Over Aluminum Dispute

China has told the Trump administration to tread carefully in a spat over aluminum exports if it wants to avoid damaging the relationship between the world’s two largest economies. The Chinese Ministry of Commerce on Thursday disputed U.S....

Viewpoint
06.08.17

Can China Really Lead the World on Climate?

Isabel Hilton

On Wednesday, the governor of California, Jerry Brown, found himself, not for the first time, with more in common with Chinese President Xi Jinping than with the president of his own nation, Donald Trump. Just days after President...

The China Africa Project
04.26.17

The U.N.’s Role in China’s African Development Agenda

Eric Olander, Cobus van Staden & more

China’s embrace of multilateral diplomacy in Africa is a relatively new phenomenon. For years, Beijing rejected the Western aid model, preferring instead to work bilaterally with African governments where they often employed aid (...

Russia, China Block U.N. Sanctions on Syria over Gas Attacks

Russia on Tuesday cast its seventh veto to protect the Syrian government from United Nations Security Council action, blocking a bid by Western powers to impose sanctions over accusations of chemical weapons attacks during the six-year Syrian...

China to Suspend All Imports of Coal from North Korea

China will suspend all imports of coal from North Korea starting Feb. 19, the country’s commerce ministry said in a notice posted on its website on Saturday, as part of its efforts to implement United Nations sanctions against the country.

Viewpoint
09.01.16

How to Deal With China’s Human Rights Abuses

Sophie Richardson

When world leaders touch down in early September in the city of Hangzhou for this year’s G20 leaders’ summit, which China will they see? The one of glossy skylines, enviable growth statistics, and perfectly choreographed...

The China Africa Project
07.26.16

There Are a Lot More Chinese Soldiers in Africa Today... And Likely More To Come

Eric Olander, Cobus van Staden & more

Around 2014, the Chinese began to shift their military engagement strategy in Africa to include the deployment of combat-ready infantry units to countries like Mali and South Sudan where the United Nations is being actively targeted by Islamist...

The China Africa Project
06.24.16

Why the Stakes Are So High for China in South Sudan

Eric Olander, Cobus van Staden & more

Nowhere else in Africa do China’s financial, diplomatic, and geopolitical interests confront as much risk as they do in South Sudan. Beijing has...

Conversation
05.16.16

Escalation in the South China Sea

Julian G. Ku, M. Taylor Fravel & more

International tensions are rising over the shipping lanes and land formations in the South China Sea. Last week, the People’s Liberation Army Air Force scrambled fighter jets in response to a U.S. Navy ship sailing near the disputed Fiery Cross...

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