Looking back at the year in U.S.-China relations.
Welcome to VOA Asia Weekly. I'm Chris Casquejo in Washington. That story is just ahead, but first, making headlines.
North Korea sent several small drones into South Korean airspace Monday, Seoul officials said, prompting South Korea’s military to fly its own unmanned surveillance aircraft north of the sensitive border. South Korea also scrambled fighter jets and attack helicopters to respond to the North Korean incursion but failed to bring down any of the drones.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un unveiled new goals for the country's military for 2023 at an ongoing meeting of the ruling Workers' Party, state-run television KRT showed on Wednesday. Kim hinted at another year of intensive weapons tests and tension.
The death toll from heavy rains and floods that devastated parts of the Philippines over Christmas weekend continues to rise, the national disaster response agency said Wednesday. More than 81,000 people are still in shelters.
Reuters reports hospitals in China are at their breaking point from a new wave of COVID-19 cases, with one hospital in Shanghai saying it expected half of the city’s 25 million people to become infected by the end of the week. Meanwhile, China lifted COVID restrictions for international travel, prompting countries from Japan to the U.S. to require travelers from China to take mandatory tests upon arrival.
Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen said Tuesday that compulsory military service will be extended from four months to a year starting in 2024, as the self-ruled island continues to increase military readiness amid increasing tensions with mainland China. Over the weekend, China sent an unprecedented 71 planes towards Taiwan in 24 hours in a show of force.
Leaders of the United States and China agreed to maintain open lines of communication after their first in-person talks since Joe Biden became U.S. president. The meeting took place on the sidelines of November’s G-20 summit in Bali. But after years of tension over issues including trade and Taiwan, many expect frictions will persist. VOA’s Nike Ching reports.
U.S. President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping expressed an openness to repair the worsening relationship between the two countries in their first face-to-face talks since Biden became president, pledging that their countries will resume talks on major global priorities.
To follow up, Secretary of State Antony Blinken will visit China in early 2023.
“That is necessary if we’re going to responsibly manage the relationship to deal with the competition that we have so that it does not veer into conflict.”
Following House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan in August, China suspended climate and military talks with the United States. China also intensified its military deployment against the self-ruled democracy that Beijing claims as its own.
The two countries resumed climate talks during COP27 in Egypt, where U.S. special envoy John Kerry and Chinese representatives praised the renewed communication.
But analysts caution key issues that have driven competition and disagreement between the two countries still persist, including trade, technology, human rights, Taiwan, and the South China Sea.
“We see both sides building up military power, including in the Indo Pacific. The U.S. is shifting its posture there; the Chinese continues to build a Bluewater Navy, build long range strike and build a nuclear weapons triad for deterrence. And potential use along those lines. So I think competition intention is inevitable.”
In Cambodia, top defense officials from the U.S. and China discussed the need to improve crisis communications, while the U.S. continues to raise concerns about what Washington said is “increasingly dangerous” behavior by the Chinese military in the region.
Nike Ching, VOA News.
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Finally, Bangladesh launched its first metro rail service in the densely populated capital on Wednesday.
Japan is the main funder. Leaders hope that the South Asian country’s development bonanza will continue with both domestic and overseas money.
Thanks for watching VOA Asia Weekly. I’m Chris Casquejo. Until next week.