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Donald Trump says the United States is ready to move to the second phase of sanctions against Russia.
Japanese lawmakers launched leadership bids after Prime Minister resigns.
China's foreign trade grew by 35 in first eight months, showcasing resilience despite external volatility.
China criticizes Canadian and Australian warships transiting Taiwan Strait.
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US President Donald Trump says the White House is ready to move to the second phase of sanctions against Russia.
Media reports say Donald Trump has grown increasingly pessimistic about brokering an end to the Ukraine crisis anytime soon or seeing the presidents of Russia and Ukraine meet in person.
Trump says European leaders will visit the United States to discuss ways to end the conflict, adding that he will also speak to Russian President Vladimir Putin soon.
A Russian aerial attack overnight has destroyed a key building in Kiev's government district for the first time.
So for more joining us now on the line is Dr Zhang Xin, Deputy Director of the Center for Russian Studies, East China Normal University.
So thank you very much for joining us today, Dr. Zhang Xin.
The second phase of sanctions against Russia mainly refers to imposing secondary tariffs on countries that trade with Russia.
How realistic is it for the Trump administration to impose such tariffs?
To some extent, no.
Secondary sanction is the major problem. tool left in President Trump's toolbox.
For one tariff is the major policy tool President Trump seemed to stuck with at the early stage of his presidency.
He likes that.
He feels very comfortable using tariff as a major tool of economic statecraft uh.
Secondly uh, the recent uh us domestic legal changes make imposing tariffs in a traditional way, as trump has used for the past a few months as his sort of centerpiece of economic pressure strategy, much harder.
This is a recent um.
The federal court shut the door on using tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Power Act.
So Trump now needs to use a slightly different way if he wants to continue to use the tariff as a major economic policy tool.
So now a secondary sanction becomes almost the only viable lever left.
So in that sense, I think if President Trump wants to do something to continue to pressure Russia, particularly pressure Russia, and then secondary sanction is the major policy left.
So U.S.
Treasury Secretary Scott Benson has said that.
Quote we are now in a race between how long can the Ukrainian military hold up versus how long can the Russian economy hold up?
Unquote.
Do you think this represents an accurate assessment of the situation?
So if we want to look at the situation from a sort of short-term perspective, then I would agree.
I think the Russian president's meeting with a US president a few weeks ago in Alaska essentially bought the Russian side more time.
Now, since then, we seem to further actually get a much better sense that the Russian government is not going to make an easy decision for any give up on its position on sort of winning the ultimate victory uh on the battlefield right.
So the i think that the meeting in alaska essentially uh works to uh president putin, to russian government's uh advantage to a large, large extent.
Now it seems um, the russian side still want to uh uh buy time on one hand on the diplomatic side, particularly with the united states.
On the other hand, intensify its uh it's a military pressure on the other hand then, from the ukrainian side, if it still wants to keep its position on a battlefield, of course more support, military support, financial support from its allies, but also, on the other hand, in the hope that um the Russian economy will lose some of its resilience in a war context.
And to some extent, we do see a sign of stagnation in the Russian economy, particularly since the beginning of this year.
One interesting and I think an important episode during the past few days at the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok is President Putin actually had an exchange of words with a major economic technocrat who argues russian economy is in stagnation.
But president putin strongly opposed that idea.
He didn't didn't agree with that statement to russian economy in the stagnation.
But anyway, that exchange of words, uh debate itself do show that the Russian economy has not been doing well, as we see in the past two and two half years.
So I think that the balance between Ukraine's military resilience on one hand and how resilient the Russian economy is is indeed a part of a major political calculation, political battle now.
So what could be the specific issues that will be discussed when certain European leaders meet Mr Trump in the United States this week?
Very likely the main issue would be how to better coordinate the position on Ukraine, on Russia, between Europe and the United States.
That's very likely will be the main issue, particularly how to coordinate after the Alaska summit, after the recent further intensified attack on Ukraine from Russia, after we see that Russia is not interested in any diplomatic give up or compromise anytime soon.
I think that's in this new context how to coordinate and it's also possible some of the recent in the past maybe three, two or three weeks, some of the other major events uh will be touched upon uh, for example, the uh, the recent uh shine corporation organization summit in tinging and the in particular the uh trilateral sort of presence of the trilateral national leaders from China, Russia and North Korea in Beijing during the Chinese military parade.
I think for a lot of the European leaders, this is something significant.
They would probably like to discuss with the US leaders on how to interpret that and whether there should be corresponding policy response to that.
So why do you think Russia has intensified attacks on Ukraine since Trump and Putin held a summit in Alaska?
My reading is the Alaska meeting essentially, as I just briefly explained, turned out to work in Russia's favor to a large extent.
President Putin essentially won his diplomatic rehabilitation through this meeting with the US president and effectively bought the Russian side more time, and then without any serious commitment or any concrete compromise, and then there's just more time on the table the Russians can work with.
And also he probably says there is no effective uh policy.
Is effective policy tools from the us side, particularly part of a penalty that united governments can can mobilize anytime soon against against russia?
So as the follow-up, I think your Russian leader sees the value that through military means he and the Russian government can achieve the ultimate victory without much penalty or negative policy reaction from either the United States or from Ukraine's allies from the West.
So actually, in a recent media interview, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Trump's summit with Putin in Alaska gave the Russian leader what he wanted, namely a chance to meet with Mr Trump in person.
How do you look at Zelensky's comment?
On that particular statement, actually, I would agree with Zelensky's assessment.
This bilateral meeting indeed gave President Putin a chance, as I call it, a diplomatic rehabilitation with the West.
It also shows the european leaders right this is the big boss.
A us president is the big big boss.
See, i can sit down, talk with him on equal footing and then we can, between the two leaders, we can decide that the most important issues without europeans directly involved, And then there was not much sort of effective penalty – threat of penalty from the US side, right.
So it achieved these two sets of goals.
And then, as a follow-up, as I just explained, further intensified a military attack on Ukrainian territory, particularly some of the big cities, including Ukraine.
The capital city of Kiev in the past few days also proved the point.
Russia is having the upper hand.
Europeans do not have anything they can do to work against Russia.
So yes, I agree with Zelensky's assessment.
Thank you very much for joining us.
Dr. Zhang Xin, Deputy Director of the Center for Russian Studies, East China Normal University.
Coming up, Japanese lawmakers launch leadership bids after Prime Minister resigns.
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Japan is now facing a month-long process to select its next prime minister, following Shigeru Ishiba's resignation as leader of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party.
The party will hold an election to choose a new leader, but the next LDP president is not automatically guaranteed a premiership.
Meanwhile, the ruling coalition has lost its majority in both chambers of parliament.
So for more.
Joining us now on the line is Dr Rong Ying Chair, Professor at the School of International Studies, Sichuan University.
Thank you very much for joining us.
Thank you for having me.
Professor Rong, we know Shigeru Ishiba's departure comes as Japan faces a cost-of-living crisis, in particular, with the country's rice prices reaching their highest rate of increase in over 50 years in June this year.
Should Shigeru Ishiba and the ruling coalition, particularly the ruling LDP, be responsible for this cost of living crisis in Japan?
Well yeah, I think, Prime Minister Ishiba and LDP, they are ruling parties, they are prime ministers, so naturally.
I think nobody would be blamed or should be accountable except, I think, Prime Minister himself and the LDP.
But to be fair, I think the crisis, the inflations and others, I mean the courses, are much more complicated.
As a matter of fact, not only Japan, but many countries in the world are having I mean similar problems.
So the question is why, I think, the voters or, in this case, I think, Prime Minister Shiba, despite the fact that he's enjoying a recent rise of support he had to, I think, resign.
That is, I think, the question we may have to know or ask.
Okay.
So some people say the LDP is facing or is faced with its worst crisis since the party's founding.
What is your take on this?
Well, LDP is definitely in serious trouble, unprecedented trouble, not only because, I think, for the first time In 70 years, after its fully sort of establishment 1955, it lost the two houses, both the lower houses and upper houses.
But because it seems that whatever happens in the few weeks, whether I think the new president or new leadership of LDP were not able to provide a convincing answer to the question we are asking.
So that is the problem facing LDP and facing the Japan politics.
Now, it took Shigeru Ishiba 15 years and several attempts to become Japan's prime minister.
Then it took him only less than a year to lose this job.
What do you think this tells us about Japan's current politics?
Japanese politics has always been very unstable, particularly in recent years.
We have seen, I think, in the past 20 years, two decades and more.
We have so many prime ministers rotating like revolving doors.
There's a joke for those Japanese observers.
I think it will become even more difficult for us to remember, to memorize the prime minister, because there are so many prime ministers.
Not only, of course, not because Japanese names, English names are very difficult to understand.
I suspect that it is also very much a speculation, shared by many observers, that Japan's politics has now entered again an area where we're going to have many prime minister, most likely one every year.
That was what we had had in early 2000.
So Japanese politics has always been very unstable and has been very uncertain, but there are some rules.
There are some norms, some games, I mean, for Japanese politicians.
So if the prime minister, or the lead president of LDP in this case, does not do well economically, and somebody have to take the accountability, and it is so for Prime Minister Ishiba to, time is up for him.
Even though he did not want to get down, as he rightly said, he has been working very hard in his lifetime and running for the prime minister for five times.
He's very, I think, kind of a resilient guy and very, I think, with strong willpower.
And it's very unconventional.
Unfortunately, I think you play the game, and you play the game of Japanese politics.
You have to follow the rules.
Now, with regard to this race to become the next leader, two prominent names have now emerged.
Former Economic Security Minister, Sani Takashi and current Farm Minister or Agricultural Minister, Shijiro Kiyozumi.
With regard to the former person we have mentioned, if elected I mean Takashi will be the first female Japanese prime minister.
Do you think Japan is now ready for a female leader, a female prime minister?
That's a great question.
I'm not sure I can answer your question directly.
Rather, I would like to refer to what happened last year.
As a matter of fact, I think Takeuchi herself did very well in the last year's presidential election of DP.
As a matter of fact, she was the first and followed by Ishiba.
But unfortunately, when it comes to the runoff, I mean there are some deals, there are some tricks done by the old gods of the LDP.
So in the end, I think she lost the runoff.
So the trick or the deal was not made because of the I mean whether I mean Japanese life, already a female.
Rather, it is about political tendency, political positions.
I think at that time the Japanese, these dealmakers, that old guard, thought that Japan were not ready or may not happy with kind of left, right-leaning or conservative politicians as much as uh uh uh takaichi.
So i don't know, uh uh, this time one year, almost 11 months later, whether the japanese politics or their reading about these of the gods uh had remained unchanged, or kind of different ideas or different views about that.
I guess, from a Chinese perspective, why we pay attention to Takeichi is that she is sometimes known as a hawkish on China right.
Very much so.
I think, not only because of hawkish on China, rather historical outlook, historical perspective are very much, I think, against the fact but more importantly I think close to the right wing.
This is something I think not only may raise concerns within the party of the DP, but also may cause trouble to Japan's relationship with its neighbors China, South Korea Korea, and also I mean countries in Asia.
So any new LDP leader will still need the approval from both chambers of parliament to become Japan's prime minister.
So, with the ruling coalition being a minority in both houses currently, how likely could any next LDP president win the vote?
That's again a great question.
I think they have no other except, first and foremost hopefully, I think they would continue to keep the KOMETO as a partner in the coalition and in the meantime, win over other opposition parties.
Otherwise, there are other where the opposition parties may work together.
I mean to join to make a coalition.
In that case I think even the LDP.
That would be a race between the LDP coalition, the vice opposition parties.
This is another scenario which may not very much, I think, likely because the opposition party is in disarray.
But I think we also have to keep it in mind.
So, Wes, what you have elaborated, I mean, very briefly, the final question before we let you go.
Why do you think sometimes Japan is also known in the West as a very stable democracy?
Do you think it deserves this label?
Well, I think it all depends on how it is. one defines stability.
I think if we talk about the opposition, I mean LDP.
It is true for most of the history of time in the post-war, LDP has very much, I think sitting, I mean the ruling party.
But if you look at the rotating I mean the prime ministers that have been rotating, like I mean it's a revolving door I don't think at all that it deserves the label of stable politics.
Rather.
I think Japanese politics has been too unstable.
In a sense it creates kind of no expectation that there will be stability in the Japanese public.
But having said that, I think the overall governance structure has remained unstable.
But that is not definitely, I think, kind of some blessing, because it only means that the politics in Japan or Japan as a society, It's very difficult.
Yeah, your point's well taken.
Dr. Rongying, joining us from Sichuan University.
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China's foreign trade has continued steady growth this year.
Goods imports and exports in August rose by 35 from a year earlier, the third straight month of simultaneous growth.
From January to August, overall goods trade was also up by 3.5% year on year.
ASEAN remained as China's largest trading partner, followed by the European Union and the United States.
Private firms and foreign-invested companies have been the main drivers of this momentum, even as state-owned enterprises reported a decline.
So for more.
My colleague Xu Yawen earlier spoke with Yao Shujie, Chang Kong, Professor of Economics with Chongqing University.
Professor Yao, first of all, could you please elaborate on the main driving factors behind the 35 year-on-year growth in China's goods trade, imports and exports during the first eight months?
Yeah, first of all Yawen, I'm very pleased to note that the 35 for the first eight months of the year, which is highly encouraging and positive.
It means that China's import and export is developing very steadily despite lots of uncertainty and challenges, especially the uncertainty of global intellectualism and protectionism.
China maintains this kind of momentum.
The main driving factor is China's fundamental economic conditions.
China is now the biggest manufacturer in the world, and also in the digital economy, the new industries are emerging very competitively at the global level.
So these are the two important driving factors for the steady growth of international trade.
And if you divide the trade into import and export, you will see that China exports significantly more than imports.
In the first eight months, China already generated a significant amount of trade surplus, which would add lots of momentum to the domestic market, driving the domestic economy growth.
Professor, a 35 growth in the foreign trade may seem modest on the surface, but how significant is this figure, especially in light of the global economic headwinds this year?
Yeah, I mean, for most people who are used to China's two-digit economic growth in domestic economy as well as international trade, 35 seems a little bit moderate.
But there are significance in this small number.
First of all, China's economy is already very large.
China is already the biggest merchandise trade partner in the world, bigger than the United States and other major economies.
35.
Economic growth is already a fairly large amount of export and import, which amounted to almost 30 trillion.
And secondly, I think, the structure shift of China's manufacturing merchandise trade from the low end and medium quality product into medium and high quality product.
This means that the Chinese trade already reflects China's industrial and economic upgrading from the domestic market.
Certainly, I think especially the newly emerging industries.
China has significant dominance in the global market.
And finally, China is able to diversify destination of export goods away from the more industrialized country to the less industrialized country, particularly in the emerging economy in Asia, in Africa, in Latin America and Eastern Europe.
So this is a very important development and it reflects the steadiness of the Chinese international trade.
Other countries may face declining in terms of trade, but China is actually improving.
So it is very good in my view.
Yes.
Professor Yao, we have also noticed that in the first eight months, private enterprises achieved nearly 17 trillion yuan in imports and exports, growing by 74 and accounting for around 57 of China's total foreign trade.
Meanwhile, foreign-invested enterprises also maintained positive growth.
So what factors have supported the steady growth of private enterprises in foreign trade?
And what does the growth of foreign-invested enterprises indicate about the foreign confidence in China's market?
I think we look at these detailed figures, they are the following interpretations.
First of all, you look at the Chinese economy structure, especially the trading companies, which are divided in different kinds of ownership the state ownership, the private ownership and also the foreign ownership.
The state ownership mainly focus on the domestic key economy sector, particularly the utility, the high-tech development and also the infrastructure.
The sales sector is relatively steady and probably in relative terms, is declining.
But the private economy is the major driving factor in terms of employment, in terms of taxation, in terms of producing goods which are meeting the international demand.
This sector is still increasing, I mean 7.4% compared to 3.5%, it's more than double.
So that means that the Chinese economy is now much more flexible and much more diversified in terms of ownership.
And because the private sector is more labour intensive, it is more value-added intensive.
So it is good to encourage the private sector to become ever more important in the domestic economy.
And if you look at the foreign-invested firms, although their absolute share is not as large as the private sector, but they are important to reflect the international confidence, especially foreign investors and foreign companies.
They have confidence in the domestic market of China.
They are able to come to invest in China despite these lots of negative uh forces.
Uh, you know.
We see at the international level, for example, like the united states government, uh they, they increased uh you know trade taxation to uh you know, to slow down china's export into the us market.
But investors from the us, they are very positive in terms of making the investment into the Chinese economy.
This reflects the fundamental of the Chinese economy, is very attractive not only maintaining sustaining the development of the domestic enterprises, but also provide a fairly lucrative and long-term steady marketplace for those multinational companies into China to make more investment and also produce more goods for export.
A typical example, for example, like Tesla.
The new energy vehicle manufactured in Shanghai is invested by Tesla, but much of the products are exported to Europe and back to the United States.
Dr Yao Shujie, Chang Kong, Professor of Economics with Chongqing University, talking with my colleague Xu Yaowen.
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The U.S.
Commerce Department says the country's trade deficit widened more than expected in July, hitting 78 billion.
That's up sharply from $59 billion in June.
It's the largest gap in four months, as companies rush to import goods and materials ahead of the new tariffs.
A spike in gold shipment, also tied to tariff concerns, added to import surge.
Overall, US imports jumped by nearly 6 to about 359 billion, while exports edged up less than 1 to 281 billion.
Meanwhile, a disappointing job report also weighed on markets.
The United States added just 22000 jobs in August, far below expectations, while unemployment rate rose to near four-year high at 43.
For more my colleague Zhao, Yang earlier spoke with Dr Yan Liang, professor of economics with Willamette University.
So Yan.
The US trade deficit widened sharply in July and some people say it's partly due to companies stockpiling goods ahead of tariffs.
So what do you think of it?
What's the real impact of Trump's tariff strategy?
Well, the U.S. trade deficit surged by 32.5 percent in July and reached 78.3 billion dollars.
And this is the largest since March this year.
And you're right.
I think part of the reason is due to the jump in imports driven by business rushing to stock up goods ahead of new tariffs that were set to take effect in August after the end of the pause.
But I think that also reflects this reliance of the US on the global supply chain.
Because you look at the increase in the imports of largely capital goods and industrial supplies, So what that means is that tariffs are not going to be able to promote the US domestic production of these kinds of machinery industrial goods overnight.
And so businesses, producers, they still rely on foreign supplies.
And so they rush to stock up the products before the tariffs.
So again, I think this just shows that tariffs cannot really single-handedly, you know, reduce the US's trade deficit and its reliance on the global market, the global supply chain.
And all it does is really to disrupt the supply chain but also add costs to businesses, because these tariffs are essentially paid by importers.
And so that basically reflect higher cost of production.
And tell us more about the structure of the U.S. imports and exports right now.
Trump has always argued that the tariffs will help bring down the trade deficit.
Why does the latest data show the opposite?
Well, I think that just clearly shows that Trump's narrative is false.
It does not really meet the challenge of the reality.
So what happened is again, the US rely on the international market and the global supply chain to provide capital goods, industrial supplies as well as many of the consumer goods as well.
And by imposing the tariffs, what it does is early on.
It will create this kind of front-loading effect and that's why you saw the surge in the imports in July.
But again, even after tariffs are set in place, it still does not reduce the needs of many businesses to import from abroad because again, domestic manufacturing capacity cannot be ramped up overnight.
Not to mention, I think, many of the Trump's policies, like the way he scaled back on industrial policies and also have mass deportation policies.
None of this is helpful for domestic producers to ramp up their production in place of imports.
So it's likely that we're going to see imports continue to go up unless the economy is depressed enough that demand falls.
Then we're likely to see import to fall.
So in other words, tariff is not really causing an increase in domestic production to replace imports.
But what it could do is to really significantly reduce demand domestically, and that is not good for the economy.
And when it comes to exports, July saw some rebounds of the exports.
But we also know, you know, because of Trump's unilateral trade policies it really upset many of the trade partners.
And, to the extent that you know, the US farm industry, for example, has saw the largest trade deficit.
They have become, you know, net importers instead of exporters, which reversed their long term.
You know export policy net exporter status.
Pretty much since 2022, the farm industry has been a net importer.
And so this tariff simply worsened it.
We're also seeing tourism has gone down, especially when people are hesitant to visit the United States due to these anti-immigration policies and also anti-student visa policies.
So I think these kinds of exports of services were very important for the United States before.
But now I think all these tariffs simply derail that prospect of the U.S.'
's healthy exports.
And in what specific ways have Trump's tariffs disrupted the global supply chains, do you think?
As I mentioned earlier, it really caused the costs of imports to rise, which means this will translate into high production costs.
It would also create much of a delay because many of the importers need to find.
You know custom brokers and try to navigate through.
You know all these different tariffs schemes and the policies.
And it also, you know, really heightened uncertainty.
So all of these affect the supply chain within the United States and its connections and reliance on global supply chain.
So, you're likely to see, the impacts are very pronounced in sectors like retail industry, automotive tech especially semiconductors apparels, appliances and clean energy, like solar panels and so on and so forth, because these industries very much rely on imported components and materials.
So with tariffs, the producers will need to find new suppliers and find new places, and also trying to see if they're able to increase domestic supplies.
And so all of these, I think, create a lot of disruptions and delays and also cost increases.
So those are really not conducive for this goal of revolving domestic industries.
And Yan.
So the latest data shows that the US added just 22000 jobs in August, which is far below the expectations.
And while the unemployment rose to near four-year high.
So what does this tell us?
And what does this number do for the possibility of a significant rate cut coming up in September?
Well, I think you know this kind of leg luster, shall we say.
You know job data really showcase.
This is not just a one month situation.
This seemed to be a trend already, especially when you look at the June's job creation number has downward revised.
And now it's actually, you know, losing 13000 jobs in June, rather than, you know, positive job creations.
And this is the first time, first negative growth since 2020.
So I think the labor market, you know, according to some analysts it has going from being frozen to now cracking.
So we're likely to see, you know, job creation and job market continue to to worsen again due to a series of counterproductive policies like the ICE, you know, deportation policies, like tariffs.
And also cutting government jobs and so on and so forth.
As a matter of fact, when you look at August, other than the health care industries and also the hospitality industries, many of the other sectors are seeing job cuts construction job cuts, manufacturing sector actually losing 31000 jobs.
So I think the situation is getting worse when it comes to the labor market.
And so this does, I think, create some sort of optimism that the Fed is going to cut more rates or cut more aggressively in September.
Some now think that Fed will cut 50 basis points instead of 25.
And some also argue you know, following September's cut, there might be more cuts down the road this year.
As many as three cuts this year.
But I think again, according to the Chicago Fed chair, I think it still remains to be seen what the inflation data looks like to really decide on whether or not there will be rate cuts or more rate cuts.
Because, let's not forget, you know, despite a weakness in the job market, the inflationary pressure is rising, you know, due to tariffs and the labor market situation.
So, you know, because the Fed has to balance, right, both the job market and also inflation.
So I think it really remains to be seen whether or not the inflation data will help to promote the scenario of rate cuts.
I think, you know, the Federal Reserve is really walking a relatively tight rope at this point.
And talking about the U.S. economy, tariffs is one of the concerns.
Another is the rising national debt.
So the founder of Bridgewater, Ray Dalio, says the US government debt is a bigger threat to the US dollar's reserve status.
So what do you make of that?
Well, I think Dalio's point is that, you know, with the 37 trillion US government debt, either you know the government will risk default and you know the Federal Reserve would have to allow the interest rate to rise, or it will have to print money, so to speak, to cover the obligations.
And that will weaken the dollar's value.
Well, I think you know the default risk is it's very low or to the minimum, because the US does have the dollar, you know, to pay its debt.
But I think, you know, mostly with the US's, especially Trump's administrations, unilateral, you know, tariffs and many other counterproductive policies that pretty much severe its ties to the global economy.
I think that is really what made many investors worry about the dollar values.
You know, if the US does not want to play a important role in the global trading system or it's not really allowing for free flows of capital, then this will really cause some concerns about the US's commitment to the global financial architecture.
And so that would, I think, significantly weaken dollars value, not as much as the government debt per se.
And I think the interest rate could rise or could fall really depends on the inflationary and job market numbers.
I don't think the debt is going to have a lot of say or a lot of impact on the rising rates.
But that said, I do think that again, mostly because of Trump's policies that really disrupt the global economic system and the economic order, I think that has really made people worried about the US'.
's commitment and therefore weakened its reserve currency status.
Yan Liang, professor of economics with Willamette University, talking with my colleague Zhao Yang.
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China's military has criticized two foreign warships sailing through the Taiwan Strait as a provocation.
The Eastern Theater Command of the People's Liberation Army says it followed and warned the Canadian frigate Quebec and the Australian guided missile destroyer Brisbane.
A spokesperson within the command has accused the two vessels' actions of sending wrong signals and heightening security risks.
So joining us now on the line is Dr Liu Kuangyu from the Institute of Taiwan Studies, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
Thank you very much for joining us.
So, first of all, why are the actions of the Canadian and Australian warships a provocation, at least from China's perspective?
Well, first, very obviously, these are warships from Canada and Australia.
They are military vessels.
Military vessels don't come near China for peace, right?
So they were acting – they were exercising military actions only a few miles away from China's mainland and Taiwan.
And also we know that the transit through the Taiwan Straits are –
During the past years, our so-called method, a general method for the US to challenge China's core interests and our sovereignty over Taiwan.
So this production is very obvious.
And also we see the timing of this transit through the strait.
This transit follows China's Victory Day military parade, underscores the so-called political implication of Western allies demonstrating the so-called unity and upholding so-called freedom navigation in this Western Pacific.
And that's a provocation, that's a challenge China's rhetoric and also the post-war international order, showing the so-called democratic countries will take concrete actions to stand up against China as a democratic camp, as a camp.
So this demonstration of choosing side.
And third is that we know that there is a strong bond between canada and australia, which lies in the five eyes alliance and through primarily, and an intelligence network is now rooting very deep uh foundation of mutual coordination in in the military.
So this operation had as the us out as a no longer merely uh following sue, but also waiting to share greater responsibilities in the so-called Pacific defense.
So I guess probably a key issue here is, is the Taiwan Strait an international waterway?
Well, we know that Taiwan is a part of China and both sides of the Strait are Chinese territory and China exercises sovereignty rights and jurisdiction over the Taiwan Strait.
In accordance with the UN clause, the China's domestic clause, the waters of the Taiwan Strait are respectively classified as China's internal waters and territorial sea contiguous zone and EEZ.
That means inclusive economic zone.
So there is no so-called international waters.
In fact, this term does not exist under the international maritime law.
But also we know that, as the strait connects the East China Sea and the South China Sea, it serves a critical role for global maritime trade, with significant shipping traffic passing through it.
So China respects the right of navigation and free passage enjoyed by all countries in the relevant waters of Taiwan Strait, in accordance with Chinese laws, international law.
However, China firmly opposes any illegal activities by certain countries that, under the guise of freedom navigation, engage provocations or acts that undermine China's sovereignty and security.
And also, if you send your military troops and warships to this water, that's not innocent.
That's not innocent passage.
Now the Canadian government claims that the Canadian frigate was deployed in an operation to promote peace and security in the so-called Indo-Pacific region.
So with that in mind...
Do you think we're seeing a trend that somehow some countries are increasingly using promoting peace and security in the Indo-Pacific as a talking point to back this provocation of China on the Taiwan question?
Well first, the operation they deployed, as they said, was actually the Canada and Australia recently conducted a joint military exercise with the philippines in the south china sea and carried out so-called freedom navigation missions alongside us forces.
So this following actions in the taiwan strait does carry the significance of taking part in the us japan taiwan philippines deterrence network against chinese, against china's unification.
At the same time, this is also a response to the us pressure which have long time caused on these inter-pacific allies and partners to assume the responsibility of deterring and preventing china's reunification with and forging more expensive allies and deterring China through increased arm purchases and military operations.
So I think it is foreseeable that such operations will increase in the future, with warships from various countries appearing in Taiwan Strait through different combinations and permutations.
And one thing we need to note is that the US warships taking transit to the Taiwan Strait sharply decreased in this year and so they are, as the the us is asking, asking their allies and partners to take more of these gaps to send their troops, their vessels, to come to the taiwan strait.
So the final question, and very briefly do you think there is a likelihood that Western warships sailing through the Taiwan Strait might trigger a military clash with China, potentially in the foreseeable future?
Yes, I think the Taiwan Strait remains a flashpoint, while the Western transits are unlikely to trigger an immediate conflict, but they contribute to destabilizing the cycle of confrontation.
We see, the path of escalation hinges on whether parties adhere to calculated restraint or succumb to nationalist pressures.
For now, the status quo prevails, which is marked by tense, but controlled by interactions.
Yet the margin for error grows narrower amid intensified great power rivalry.
Thank you very much for joining us.
Dr. Liu Kuangyu from the Institute of Taiwan Studies, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
That's all the time for this edition of World Today.
To listen to this episode again or to catch up on our previous episodes, download our podcast by searching World Today.
I'm Ding He in Beijing.
Thank you so much for listening.
Bye for now.
