03 World

Ethiopia’s Middle Class Ditching Gasoline Vehicles for Electrics With Chinese EVs Dominating Race – The China-Global South Project
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Solomon Shenkutie, a ride-hailing driver in Ethiopia’s bustling capital, Addis Ababa, made a life-changing decision six months ago: he swapped his gasoline-powered car for a Chinese-made electric vehicle.

“I spent most of my earnings on fuel, and prices are only expected to rise,” said Shenkutie, who now drives a Changan Benben E-Star, a compact five-seater produced through a Sino-Ethiopian joint venture. His switch came after months of research and drew on his expertise as an electrician.

Shenkutie’s decision reflects a broader shift in Ethiopia, where the government has taken bold steps to phase out internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles. In February 2024, Ethiopia banned the import of ICE vehicles, aiming to reduce its reliance on oil and preserve dwindling foreign currency reserves. The move followed a sharp cut in fuel subsidies, which sent prices soaring from $0.21 to $0.89 per liter in less than a year.

By 2026, fuel costs are projected to triple.

“Most of my family and friends thought I was making a bad decision,” Shenkutie admitted. “But my car has exceeded expectations in terms of power, comfort, and battery life.” He purchased the vehicle with a bank loan, paying monthly installments, but now saves significantly on fuel and maintenance. “I can still comfortably provide for my family,” he said.

Tesla’s $8K Self-Driving Faces Threat as China’s Top EV Brand Gives It Away for Free – MSN
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Tesla’s steep pricing for its Full Self-Driving feature is now under pressure, as a leading Chinese electric vehicle manufacturer offers a similar capability at no extra cost.

BYD, the Chinese electric car giant, has introduced an advanced driver-assistance system across nearly all its models, causing its stock prices to surge. Drivers in China can now experience BYD’s innovative ‘God’s Eye’ driving system—even in the brand’s most affordable vehicles, which start at just £7,457.46 (69,800 yuan).

China’s deflationary pressures deepen in February – Reuters
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 China’s consumer price index in February missed expectations and fell at the sharpest pace in 13 months, while producer price deflation persisted, as seasonal demand faded and households remained cautious about spending amid job and income worries.

Beijing last week vowed greater efforts to boost consumption in the face of an escalating trade war with the U.S., but analysts expect deflationary pressures in the world’s second-largest economy to drag on.

As Trump shakes the international order, China casts itself as a model of stability – NBC News
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As President Donald Trump gave a fiery and divisive speech to a joint session of Congress last week, a much more staid political event was underway on the other side of the world.

The annual gathering of the National People’s Congress, China’s parliament, is tightly choreographed, with all decisions made in advance by the ruling Chinese Communist Party. Security is even tighter than usual around central Beijing and armies of volunteers wearing red armbands are stationed on street corners and at subway stations.

Though there are few surprises and no debate, the weeklong National People’s Congress does offer clues to China’s priorities at home and how it plans to approach the world.

Even as it faces a slowing economy, China appears to be making a strategic decision to present itself as a global stalwart amid a world in turmoil as Trump upends international trade and long-standing alliances, eroding U.S. prestige and creating an opportunity for China to fill the void.

Woke AI and ‘Green Computing’ Are Gifts to China– www.dailysignal.com
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At the recent AI Action Summit in Paris, Vice President JD Vance declared that artificial intelligence must remain “free from ideological bias and … not be co-opted into a tool for authoritarian censorship.”

But China’s rise as a global AI power poses serious challenges to Vance’s bold vision. Chinese companies under the watchful eye of the Chinese Communist Party are quietly wiring digital authoritarianism into the Western tech stack.

Despite this threat, some Western governments and tech giants are pursuing ideological agendas in the form of “AI safety” that risk ceding moral and technological high ground to China in the AI race.

To reverse China’s digital creep and bolster Western technological supremacy, Europe and Big Tech should heed Vance’s admonition. Reject AI safetyism’s anti-Western social agendas and heavy-handed regulation in favor of “AI opportunity” propelled by American innovation and values.

Why China conducted naval drills in waters between Australia and New Zealand – South China Morning Post
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China recently conducted live-fire military drills in the Tasman Sea, between Australia and New Zealand. Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has said that these drills, which led to the diversion of 49 commercial flights, were carried out without sufficient prior notification.

China’s Type 055 destroyer, one of the most advanced warships in its navy, was reportedly part of the exercise. What was China hoping to achieve with the drills?

Since Xi Jinping became China’s president in 2013 and his announcement of plans for a Maritime Silk Road, the country has been strengthening its naval power. The US’ island chain strategy – introduced by former US secretary of state John Foster Dulles during the Cold War – is an obstacle to this. These islands serve as platforms for hostile forces against China.

Meta built content censorship system to break into China, report says– mashable.com
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Mark Zuckerberg tried to get Facebook into China, where it is blocked, for well over a decade. According to a whistleblower report, Zuckerberg and Meta considered some fairly unsavory tactics to make it happen, including a censorship system and sharing user data.

The whistleblower in this case is Sarah Wynn-Williams, who filed a 78-page complaint with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The report, obtained exclusively by The Washington Post, alleges Facebook considered giving China’s ruling party the ability to censor content and squelch dissent. Also included in the report was Meta’s willingness to share user data with China.

The complaint from Wynn-Williams reportedly alleged that Facebook, in 2015, created a censorship tool for China that would allow it to remove content or shut down the site during “social unrest.” The complaint from Wynn-Williams, who was fired in 2017 from her job working on a team that worked on China policy, reportedly contains internal Meta documents.

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The complaint also alleges that Facebook faced pressure to store Chinese users’ data in China, which could’ve made it easier for the government to access the information. Facebook also allegedly considered weakening privacy protections for Hong Kong users in an effort to appease China.

Mark Zuckerberg Offered China Full Censorship Control And User Data Access, Says Meta Whistleblower: ‘Working Hand In Glove With The Chinese Communist Party’ – Benzinga
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A former Meta Platforms, Inc.  executive has accused the company and CEO Mark Zuckerberg of going to extraordinary lengths—including enabling censorship and offering data access—to gain a foothold in China.

What Happened: In a whistleblower complaint filed with the SEC in April, Sarah Wynn-Williams, Meta’s former global policy director for China, made these allegations.

She stated that the company, formerly Facebook, developed a China-specific censorship system in 2015 and proposed installing a “chief editor” to manage and potentially shut down content during periods of social unrest.

The 78-page whistleblower complaint, reviewed by The Washington Post, claims Meta was prepared to give the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) oversight of all Facebook content in China and store user data locally—making it more accessible to government surveillance.

Mark Zuckerberg Offered China Full Censorship Control And User Data Access, Says Meta Whistleblower: ‘Working Hand In Glove With The Chinese Communist Party’ – Benzinga
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Excerpt:

A former Meta Platforms, Inc.  executive has accused the company and CEO Mark Zuckerberg of going to extraordinary lengths—including enabling censorship and offering data access—to gain a foothold in China.

What Happened: In a whistleblower complaint filed with the SEC in April, Sarah Wynn-Williams, Meta’s former global policy director for China, made these allegations.

She stated that the company, formerly Facebook, developed a China-specific censorship system in 2015 and proposed installing a “chief editor” to manage and potentially shut down content during periods of social unrest.

The 78-page whistleblower complaint, reviewed by The Washington Post, claims Meta was prepared to give the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) oversight of all Facebook content in China and store user data locally—making it more accessible to government surveillance.

CCP Activists Hurl ‘Racist’ Smears For Securing American Land– thefederalist.com
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I sat in the Texas Senate State Affairs Committee hearing on March 6 watching a parade of witnesses — roughly 30 people, all but four were likely naturalized citizens or green card holders from China — rail against SB 17, a bill authored by Sen. Lois Kolkhorst, a Republican from Brenham, to stop hostile foreign entities from snapping up Texas land.

What I saw wasn’t just a policy debate; it was a masterclass in how the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) turns American freedoms into weapons against us.

SB 17, dubbed “Stopping Foreign Adversaries’ Land Grabs,” is straightforward: It bars governments, their agents, and entities from China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea from owning Texas dirt. Kolkhorst’s aim is clear: Keep hostile regimes away from our military bases, farmland, and infrastructure, like Laughlin Air Force Base in Del Rio, Texas, or the ranches feeding our state.

The bill carves out U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents, meaning most of those testifying won’t be touched by it if it becomes law. Yet, to hear them tell it, you’d think Texas was resurrecting Jim Crow and the Chinese Exclusion Act to strip Asians of their rights.

At one point, a senior political organizer from the awkwardly named National Korean American Service and Education Consortium (NAKASEC) Action Fund Texas launched into a script that could’ve been texted from Beijing.

“SB 17 threatens to unfairly strip individuals of their property rights based solely on their national origin,” they said, warning of “invasive investigations” and “seizure without due process.” They invoked Jim Crow, claiming the bill’s vagueness down to weeds three feet high as a “public nuisance,” would target immigrants, even citizens, from “designated countries.” The kicker: “Discriminatory practices have no place in our legal system.”

Then there was the witness, one of the first up, who claimed SB 17 “specifically targets the Asian community,” predicting a surge in hate crimes where“more Asian grandmas and grandpas” are attacked, their “blood on your hands.” Never mind that the bill doesn’t touch citizens or green card holders, a status most of the folks testifying likely hold. Across 30-plus testimonies, the refrain was identical: discrimination, lost land rights, racist overreach. It was a chorus so tight you’d swear they rehearsed it.

Here’s the rub: I’ve seen this playbook before. Back in 2009, as a California assemblyman, I watched Chinese consulate reps swarm our state capitol to kill a Tibet Awareness Day resolution. They leaned on Democrats, including some now big names like Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and Congressman Ted Lieu, to tank it, proving the CCP’s United Front Work Department (UFWD) doesn’t just meddle overseas; it twists U.S. politics at every level.

Seeing the same machine humming in Austin last week, I decided to shift my own testimony that day, pointing out that those who testified before me amplified a narrative straight from the Chinese Embassy as chronicled by The Washington Post in 2023: land restrictions on hostile nations “fuel Asian hatred” and “racial discrimination.” For good measure, I noted that the same Chinese Embassy threatened the U.S. with war only the day before.

The UFWD thrives on mobilizing diaspora voices and sympathetic groups like NAKASEC to cry racism, drowning out Kolkhorst’s real aim: blocking Beijing’s strategic land grabs. Texas isn’t targeting “Asian grandmas”; it’s targeting a regime that’s bought up 350,000 acres of U.S. farmland since 2010, often near military sites. Chinese entities like Fufeng Group snapping up land by Grand Forks Air Force Base or Sun Guangxin’s sprawl near Laughlin aren’t just real estate deals — they’re espionage hubs and food security plays. The FBI’s got counterintelligence cases piling up; China’s not here to play nice.

Yet the testimony I heard ignored all that. The NAKASEC organizer fretted about the Texas AG’s “expanded powers,” but SB 17’s enforcement is tied to clear security risks, not nationality witch hunts. One witness dragged up a 2020 Midland knife attack to stoke fear, but the bill’s exemptions shred their victimhood act. The same witness claimed that Texas was fourth-highest in Asian hate crimes, but Texas is the second most populous state; the progressive utopias of Washington, New York, and California ranked ahead of Texas in that same report.

This wasn’t about facts. It was theater, scripted to exploit America’s racial fault lines and dodge the CCP’s endgame.

Why does it work? Because too many Americans, lawmakers included, swallow the discrimination bait instead of seeing the UFWD’s fingerprints.

Texas isn’t alone. States like South Dakota and Georgia are fighting the same fight, passing laws to lock out hostile ownership. But the CCP’s influence machine keeps grinding, banking on our openness to choke sensible policy with guilt trips.

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Chuck DeVore is chief national initiatives officer at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, a former California legislator, and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel. He’s the author of “The Crisis of the House Never United—A Novel of Early America.”